Daniel Ricciardo, 25 years old Australian, is currently competing in Formula One for Infiniti Red Bull. He stands third in the 2014 Drivers’ Championship, 50 points behind Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes and 42 points ahead of Williams’ Valtteri Bottas. He displays growing speed and maturity with best race results; two seventh places in China and Italy.
After a horrific start in Formula 1 Gran Premio D’Italia 2014, Daniel Ricciardo still landed in fifth place and believes that Red Bull is capable of taking one of the top three positions at Singapore. “At the end, to recover and get a top five, I am really happy with that,” Ricciardo said. “Singapore should be better, if we can get fifth around Monza then we should be able to get on the podium at Singapore. That’s what we’ll aim for.”
As regards his impressive passing move on illustrious team mate Sebastian Vettel, Ricciardo commented: “Obviously Seb is smart and I think I am smart enough, so we kept it clean. He defended well and then I had another chance in the second chicane. “My lead is around 60 points over Seb. I would love to be quicker on merit and not need team orders, but the next couple of tracks are perfect for us so if we need to make any decisions if we can challenge Mercedes for the title then I am sure they will be made.”
DHL Express outlined a new standard of pure speed with the ‘DHL Fastest Lap Award’ during 2007 and this award goes to the driver who sets the fastest lap over the season. An interesting bit of information about Daniel Ricciardo is that for the second race in a row, the Australian set his fastest race lap on the final lap. Of course, he also finished ahead of Vettel yet again.
Red Bull team so far stands second with 272 points; sandwiched between Mercedes on 454 and Williams on 177. It lacked the pace to challenge Williams and ended up in fifth and sixth positions. The overall strategy of Red Bull got erroneous when they went aggressive and pitted Vettel earlier. This compromised his race in the closing stages when with fading rubber, he was not only unable to resist Bottas’s recovery drive but also fell prey to Daniel Ricciardo, who made his sole pit stop eight laps after the German.
Red Bull’s car should suit the more conventional and twisty track of and as Daniel Ricciardo recently said “The important thing in Singapore is to not get caught chasing the set-up on a Friday. The track is going to evolve, you’ve just got to be patient and let it happen without constantly tweaking your car, trying to hit a moving target. It’s one of those races where you’re never completely satisfied with the amount of preparation that you do.”