Daniel Ricciardo (P9, 2 pts): 7.5/10
A year ago, Daniel Ricciardo was celebrating a famous victory in Monaco by taking a face plant into the Red Bull swimming pool. There were no such celebrations this year of course, but nonetheless the Australian still gave his new Renault colleagues reason for some smiles and cheers with a strong qualifying performance, and a solid drive yielding a brace of championship points. The highlight was when he made it through to Q3 on Saturday, something of a surprise when his team mate Nico Hulkenberg had appeared to have had the upper hand all through practice. A penalty for Pierre Gasly (for holding up Hulkenberg in Q2) meant Ricciardo started the race from sixth and he even got the initial jump on Kevin Magnussen, but opting for an early stop under the safety car undid all that good work and left him with a frustrating afternoon ahead. He did manage to get into the top ten with a nice pass on Lando Norris, and was then handed an extra point (and position) when Romain Grosjean was handed a post-race penalty. Ninth wasn't good as Ricciardo might have been hoping for, but it probably maximised the R.S.19's potential this week.
