27/06/2021
NEWS STORY
Having finished second quickest on Friday, Daniel Ricciardo admits to being totally mystified after qualifying 13th for the Styrian Grand Prix.
The Australian's rollercoaster season continues, and as teammate Lando Norris puts his car fourth on the grid for the Styrian Grand Prix - third once Valtteri Bottas' grid penalty is applied - Ricciardo couldn't make it into Q2, having only made it out of Q1 by the skin of his teeth.
"It's a bit of a mystery, actually," he admitted. "We were obviously quick yesterday," he added, referring to FP2. "I know it's only Friday practice, I didn't expect to be fighting for pole position today. But obviously we were pretty comfortable with everything.
"We put the car on track today and we are like one second slower, pretty much," he sighed. "So, really, then qualifying was a product of also this morning, we were just off the pace.
"It's another session where we're a little bit scratching our heads. It's a bit strange."
Pushed on where he feels he is losing out, the Australian was unable to point to a specific area.
"We wouldn't say there are many answers at the moment why we obviously struggled a lot today," he said. "We'll try to figure it out, we'll try to look forward to tomorrow now but I definitely didn't expect to be here after yesterday.
"I didn't think we had a perfect car yesterday but the lap time came, and today it felt like in some areas I was just driving to the limit of the car. I couldn't go faster because I would basically run off the track, so I felt like I was pushing it but we were slower pretty much everywhere.
"We're not sure at the moment. We'll have a look at the data but as I said, not just qualifying but this morning too - it seemed like yesterday was a long time ago."
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