Ricciardo taking positives from Verstappen hype

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Daniel Ricciardo is taking the positives from the hype surrounding Max Verstappen, saying it will reflect well on him if he beats his team-mate.

Verstappen has been one of the success stories of 2016, stepping up to Red Bull and winning his first race for the team in Barcelona. A number of eye-catching performances followed, with his drive to third place in the Brazilian Grand Prix standing out as he rose from 16th place in the final stint.

One of the cars Verstappen overtook was Ricciardo as the latter struggled with a fogged visor, but the Australian believes it is positive for him to have a team-mate who is rated so highly.

"It was frustrating, I know personally that was my biggest limitation that race," Ricciardo said of having to see such a positive reaction to Verstappen's drive. "I know the car was good, so that was frustrating to not be able to deliver what the car was capable of but at the same time I’m aware that Max did a good race.

"He’s had some pretty big praise but in a way the way I see it is quite cool because the more highly regarded he is then if I can go out next year and beat him again it doesn’t make me look bad.

"If everyone’s saying he’s crap and doesn’t deserve the seat and I’m just managing to beat him then it doesn’t make me look that good. I would say he’s probably twice as good as Senna…”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.