Ricciardo too cautious on decisive quali run

Daniel Ricciardo believes he played it a little too much from the conservative side in qualifying this afternoon in Brazil, securing sixth on the grid alongside Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel.

The Aussie admitted his decisive run in the Q3 segment should have been better, and more incisive.

"I'm a bit disappointed, a little bit in myself," he acknowledged

"It was just that last lap; I had a good first sector, and then I just tried to save it, as opposed to finding more from the lap – I was probably a bit conservative.

"Maybe it's me being hard on myself, but there were a couple of corners where I was trying not to make a mistake, as opposed to trying to gain some time. It's close, so I think that makes it a bit more frustrating, but I'll learn from that."

Ricciardo was a little under a tenth of a second from his fourth-placed team mate Max Verstappen, and echoed the Dutchman's claim that Red Bull was losing out on the final part of the lap with a lack of power.

"We probably lose a little bit up the hill, but in the second sector we are not too bad, so it all evens out, and we are a lot more competitive here than we were last year."

The Red Bull Racing driver also admitted that historically, Interlagos has never been a venue he has succeeded in perfectly mastering.

"It doesn’t excite me that much, to be honest! I shouldn’t say that because it is not like I don’t try, but it is very easy…like Turn 8, 10, really easy to lock the front brake.

"I thought that is what held me back on the last lap because I was probably thinking about that too much, and being too under it. But in the end I just braked too early, too conservative.

"I didn’t enjoy the track as much last year because they put these big curbs and it was, it sounds silly but for a race driver curbs are really important.

"This year they have changed the curbs and you can sort of get on them a bit. It feels more like a race track so in saying that I have enjoyed it more this year around.

"I did feel like I got on top of it a bit better. And I felt that I did have it in me to be a bit quicker. It was probably more down to me making a couple misjudgments on my lap and being a bit under as opposed to right on that fine line."

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