Daniel Ricciardo has said that he doubts he can improve the pace of his Red Bull during the rest of this weekend’s German GP. The Australian, in his debut season with Red Bull finished third in second practice, just 0.102 off pace-setter Lewis Hamilton.
He raised the point that he believes that Red Bull may have closed on championship leaders, Mercedes, but is concerned that there may be more to come from the Silver Arrows.
The Australian, who is currently third in the world championship, thinks that Red Bull may have shown their hand too early.
“To be honest, today I think we had a good car. Unlike other Fridays, I don’t think we’ve got half a second in the car; I think we’ve extracted pretty much all of it today,” he said. “Let’s see. Maybe the track will keep evolving and help us out tomorrow but today I think the pure pace we have is quite representative to our performance.
“Hopefully that was Mercedes’ best pace as well and then we can have a fight on our hands.”
Ahead of the final practice and qualifying sessions, he added: “I think tomorrow’s the important one. They’ve done it before this year; they’ve come into qualifying and pulled half a second on everyone else. Let’s see how we go.”
With track temperatures up as far as 58 degrees in the afternoon heat in Germany, Ricciardo mentioned that the tyres were hard to handle. Pirelli have brought their two softest compounds to Hockenheim and said that the sheer heat effected the tyres badly.
Asked about the supersoft, Ricciardo said: “For one lap it’s okay. The track was really hot today, so it was pushing the tyre. But for one lap it was holding up.
“The long runs were more aggressive on tyre wear. I think this weekend will be more so than Silverstone. We’re not going to see any one stops; I think two or three will definitely be possible.”
The high track temperatures are expected to carry on into Saturday, but there is the threat of rain for Sunday’s race. Ricciardo is still preparing for a tough race, depending on the conditions.
“The podium is always my target now,” said Ricciardo. “It’s going to be up to tyre wear and weather this weekend. On Sunday, it looks like there could be a storm coming, so we’ll see.
“It’s about being smart and trying to hang on.”
Ricciardo also played down the impact losing FRIC suspension has had at Red Bull, with the loss expected to bring them closer to Mercedes.
“Not much,” he added. “It changes the ride height a little bit, there’s maybe a little bit more underneath you and the kerbs and bumps are a bit more pronounced. But in terms of balance and stuff it feels alright. Not really a big difference.”
