Ricciardo hits trouble before Australian GP start

2017 F1 season

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Daniel Ricciardo was unable to start the Australian Grand Prix from the grid after suffering a problem on his installation lap.

The Red Bull driver had already been relegated to 15th place on the grid following a gearbox change penalty. His car was damaged when he crashed during Q3 yesterday.

2017 Australian Grand Prix in pictures
His race lasted 28 laps before a fuel cell problem with his Renault power unit forced him out.

“For all these things to happen at my home race that’s probably the most frustrating thing,” he said.

“We were on the back foot already after the crash in qualifying and then today we had an issue during the warm-up lap followed by a second issue in the race. On both occasions the car just came to a stop so I couldn’t do anything else.”

“But look, it’s the first race so hopefully we’ll move forward from this.”

Ricciardo said his team mate’s performance in the race gave him some cause for optimism after a difficult first race weekend of the year for Red Bull.

“Max’s pace in the race looked a bit more encouraging, so I think we’re better than what we’re showing but it’s still a bit of a puzzle we’re trying to figure out.”

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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13 comments on “Ricciardo hits trouble before Australian GP start”

  1. Bummer!

    Horner said to James Allen its electrical, needs a reset!

  2. Seems like this is the 3rd year running that one Red Bull has a DNS in Melbourne.

  3. They’re trying to get it restarted after getting recovered back to the pits – is that OK to do?

  4. I’ve got a bad feeling about this year…

  5. Does someone know why he retired at the end?

    1. He had an engine problem. He was asked to turn off the engine.

    2. Fuel pressure…..

  6. Guybrush Threepwood
    26th March 2017, 8:05

    I think Ricciardo has been given Webber’s car.

    1. After Vettel and Kvyat had to drive it you’d think Red Bull would have had that car crushed by now.

  7. Third year in a row that a Red Bull driver faces a technical problem before the start of the race (either on an installation lap to the grid/back to the pits or on the formation lap), so this venue is starting to become some kind of curse on the team (sarcasm), and furthermore, this is the second year in a row that this GP has featured one extra formation lap (which I coincidentally anticipated), and therefore, the second edition in a row that lost one lap from the full race distance.

  8. Feel really bad for Ricciardo– seemed like the whole country was especially behind him this year, and he had a terribly frustrating weekend.

  9. Rotten result for him but possibly not as bad as actually competing and finishing the race in what was an embarrassingly slow car this weekend.

    Hopefully they can get on top of it before China – clearly there’s a lot of work to do.

  10. That was disastrous weekend. Maybe Webber’s bad luck goes to him now.

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