Daniel Ricciardo

Daniel Ricciardo and his struggles continued in the Spanish GP. The Australian finished 12th and revealed his thoughts on the race.

With Monaco GP just around the corner, McLaren and the Honey Badger will look to improve. He pitted during lap 11, changing to soft tires, hoping for better grip and pace, but the result was still the same. After the race, Ricciardo was certainly disappointed and hid his frustration with a smile, as he usually does. ADVERTISEMENT Saturday’s qualifying would have further boosted his confidence as he landed in Q3 and beat his teammate Lando Norris. ADVERTISEMENT

Lando Norris has revealed he has been suffering from tonsillitis across the Spanish Grand Prix F1 weekend.

“Lando did not feel well all weekend but showed great fighting spirit battling it through and bringing home some points for the team. We did a three-stop race, so I have four sets of tyres today and was very, very slow and all of them so not sure. “I've had to miss a lot of engineering sessions, which has compromised my weekend, and I definitely wasn't as prepared for the Grand Prix as I could have been. And it wasn’t it wasn’t like I had understeer - I mean, I did - but it was just overall lack of grip. McLaren team boss Andreas Seidl added: “It was a long and challenging Spanish GP under very hot conditions. I thought at the start of the race, it was very, very slow.

Daniel Ricciardo's Formula 1 season might be one to forget but could it result in a return to Australia?

“I need to – even if I don’t do the race – I need to drive a Supercar around Bathurst,” he told GP Racing magazine. However, Ricciardo would need to take a significant pay cut to race V8s. He is speculated to earn $15 million a year in Formula 1, while he might pocket around $2 million racing V8s. “He is one of the best drivers and most recognised athletes in the world; it would be fantastic to have him race a Supercar at some point.”

Daniel Ricciardo was a bemused man after the Spanish Grand Prix, with the McLaren driver unable to explain where the pace in his upgraded MCL36 had gone, ...

But after his struggles in Barcelona, the eight-time race winner admitted that he was hoping to discover that there had been an issue on his car in order to help ease his mind. “I thought at the start of the race it was really, really slow and I thought maybe temperatures just got too high or something with the tyres. When asked about where the pace in his car had gone, Ricciardo said: “That is the question that I’ll be searching for as well in the debrief and for the next few hours.

Ricciardo held eighth place early on but was overhauled by Esteban Ocon, Lando Norris and Yuki Tsunoda during the first stint. Ricciardo lost further ground ...

I don’t know that for a fact but I certainly saw the cars pass me and pull away very quickly.” “I thought at the start of the race it was very slow and that temperatures just got too high or something, at the start you’re obviously fighting and things like that can happen. “It [grip] wasn’t there from the start, and it wasn’t like ‘ah I had understeer’ – I did – but it was just overall lack of grip,” he said.

Ricciardo drifted from ninth to 12th to miss another points finish in a race which saw Red Bull's Max Verstappen come out victorious ahead of teammate Sergio ...

“I’ve been a bit on the backfoot this weekend as most of my energy has been spent fighting off this illness. It felt like over a second at times. The race head-to-head stands at 4-2 to Norris so far this season. With that in mind, I’m really pleased to have come out of the race with decent points for the team.” “Today was tough,” said Norris. “I was feeling really unwell before the race as I’m suffering with tonsillitis, and that, in combination with the high temperatures, made this one of the hardest races I’ve ever done. It comes after Ricciardo claimed a rare win over Norris in qualifying, thanks only to his young McLaren teammate having his track time deleted in Q2 and seeing the Brit eliminated.

McLaren boss Zak Brown has given Daniel Ricciardo a brutal reality check, declaring his teammate Lando Norris has a clear “edge” over the Australian.

“I think he should be fine. “I think it also points to how good Lando is,” he said. I’m not really sure why, to be honest, so we’ll try to have a look and understand it. “It’s one of those races that it was so slow that you kind of, nearly sounds bad to say, but you hope that something was wrong,” he said. “I think Lando is one of the best drivers in the world at the moment and I think it is also kind of a compliment to how good Lando is when you see the gap that exists.” “He was very ill,” he said.

Daniel Ricciardo is among the most highly-rated drivers in F1, but his struggles in McLaren are not even near their end claims Zak Brown.

There is a big mental element to the sport. “All drivers are different, I’ve dealt with Pablo Montoya, Fernando Alonso to our current drivers,” Brown added. Thus, McLaren yet again is struggling in the constructors’ standings against their rivals. I think all you can do is keep working hard as a team. Does he shout at them or keep an arm around their shoulder? His far less experienced teammate Lando Norris is easily performing better than him.

Lando Norris was taken for examination by McLaren's medical team following his eighth-place finish at the Spanish Grand Prix.

We need to make sure he gets some good rest now in the next four days before we then go again in Monaco." "Obviously he was not feeling well all weekend. The 22-year-old was withdrawn from his post-race media duties and instead went straight to the motorhome to be looked over by the team doctor.