Ricciardo: 'Good thing about 2021 was I didn't know my strengths'
F1 News
- GPblog.com
Daniel Ricciardo says he is ready for an exciting 2022 after a difficult first season at McLaren. He expects more exciting races, as the new season's cars are very much changing and, he says, are more like Formula 2 cars.
Ricciardo got off to a rough start
Ricciardo began a difficult first year at McLaren. While teammate Lando Norris reached the podium several times, the Aussie struggled to get used to the MCL35M. He says in conversation with Auto, Motor und Sport that he had to drive the car differently and it felt unnatural.
In 2022, Ricciardo expects to get off to a better start, having learned from last season in a special way. "I think the good thing about 2021 was that I never really knew what my strengths were," he says. Often the Australian wondered why he was fast or precisely at what points of a circuit he was fast.
New opportunities in 2022
A lot will change in 2022, so it remains to be seen whether Ricciardo will benefit much from the improvements made in 2021. He himself knows that the feel of the new car will be very different. "The cars will be much more like Formula 2 cars with the low noses," he said. Ricciardo expects because of this change that the cars will react very differently at the kerbstones.
The fact that the new F1 cars are more similar to the cars driven in Formula 2 is not a problem for Ricciardo. "In Formula 2 we see a lot of exciting races. Of course all the cars there are the same, but I think some of the new rules can fix the problems in Formula 1," he concludes.