Daniel Ricciardo secures a points finish in Baku

Daniel Ricciardo crossed the line in P9 in what was a dramatic weekend at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. His qualifying ended abruptly in Q2 after crashing into the wall and putting him 13^th on the grid for the race. Sunday saw him climb through the field and secure a points finish.

The majority of the drivers moved up a position with three laps to go after Max Verstappen – who was leading at the time – crashed out of the race, causing a red flag. Upon restart, Lewis Hamilton had issues with his brakes into the first corner and went into the runoff, dropping him from second-place.

Ricciardo found himself mid-pack and managing his tyres for most of the race.

Points for @danielricciardo 👍

The Aussie brings home P9 in an eventful #AzerbaijanGP 😅#F1 pic.twitter.com/tNUa4qqQBk

— F1 Australian Grand Prix (@ausgrandprix) June 6, 2021

“There were moments today in the race where I was thinking, ‘I hope it becomes a bit more exciting, and suddenly it did,” Ricciardo said.

“We had some positive moments, but also a few difficult periods. I flat-spotted the Hard a bit, so that became tricky for the last few laps before the red flag, but not too bad beforehand.”

“The last start, I felt like I got a good launch and had a good run on the outside, but there wasn’t really much room with a couple of cars on the inside. It just all bottlenecked into Turn Two, and I felt a hit from behind. I couldn’t really do much, but we’ll keep working on our plan and keep moving forward.”

McLaren teammate Lando Norris came away with a P5 after gaining two places at the restart.

Ricciardo will be looking to spend more time in the simulator before the French Grand Prix in two weeks.