Track Torque: ‘Incred-a-bull’ for Ricciardo

DANIEL Ricciardo drove the race of his life in the Malaysian Grand Prix last Sunday, taking the lead on the 41st lap when Lewis Hamilton blew up his Mercedes in a cloud of smoke!

Ricciardo and fiery teammate Max Verstappen had a really great dice before both drivers were given the “take a drink” message by their Red Bull boss Christian Horner.

This obviously meant “take it easy”, rather than “take each other out” as they seemed just about to do!

From then on they remained 1-2 and only a couple of seconds apart to the finish of the race with Nico Rosberg just 25 seconds behind at the flag.

Hamilton was not happy with his engine failure and intimated that there was foul play at hand with the high number of engine failures he has suffered this year.

Could it be sabotage; that was the question? I think not, in a team as highly respected as Mercedes.

The three drivers were a very happy picture on the podium as they celebrated together, with Rosberg delighted to now be 23 points ahead of Hamilton in the title race.

We again saw a good solid drive from Kimi Raikkonen in the sole remaining Ferrari into fourth position after team-mate Sebastian Vettel had made a mess of it at the first corner by driving into the back of Rosberg, punting him off but, worse, breaking his own suspension.

Rosberg proceeded to carve his way back from 17th position to finish on the podium as described above but Vettel was hit with a three place grid drop penalty in Japan for causing the collision.

Of the Williams’ drivers, Valtteri Bottas had the better of it after a good drive to finish fifth, while Felipe Massa had the bad luck and duly finished 13th.

Sergio Perez made the best of Force India into sixth position while team-mate Nico Hulkenberg came home eighth in the second car.

As predicted the McLaren Hondas did have a better run.

Fernando Alonso was once again incredible at the start, gaining 10 places on the opening lap after starting at the back of the grid, finally finishing in a very well earned seventh spot.

Jenson Button, in the other McLaren Honda, didn’t have as exciting a race as his team-mate but still did very well in his 300th grand prix to finish ninth.

I do believe this team will rise to the occasion at next week’s Japanese Grand Prix and even more so in 2017.

Lastly, the one point earned by Jolyon Palmer in the Renault was very well deserved and necessary for the team as it gives them a much higher status with Bernie Ecclestone from now on.

Next race is at Suzuka in Japan this Sunday. Qualifying will be at 7.50am on Saturday and the race on Sunday starts at 7am.

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