Daniel Ricciardo says Ferrari's inconsistent pace is "confusing" for Red Bull as the two teams fight for second in the constructors' championship.
Red Bull has had the better results over the past three races, but Ferrari was hampered by Sebastian Vettel retiring in Malaysia, while both drivers also had penalties in the Japanese Grand Prix. With Ferrari quick at Suzuka - as Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen finished ahead of Ricciardo - the Australian admits the fluctuations in form between both teams is difficult to understand.
"Ferrari have been extremely fast lately," Ricciardo said. "In Japan they did a very good job. Probably quicker than we expected. But is has been a bit like that. Some places we have been quicker where we did not expect. But then we’ve gone to places like Japan where we thought we would be quicker than them and we weren’t necessarily.
"So it is still a bit confusing for everyone to know who has got the better package and what tracks suit who, but maybe they just got it right that weekend and put it altogether. Seb still did not end up with a podium. I have not watched the complete race but it looked like he had a car for the podium, so they probably underachieved what the car was capable of. But nonetheless I expect them to be pretty quick here.
"It is going to be close again with … it is sort of just guess work now. The high speed stuff in sector 1 is in a way similar to what we have in Suzuka sector 1, and they were pretty strong there, so we will have our work cut out. If both of our cars want to finish in front of them we will have to execute pretty well."
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