Red Bull hangover still hitting Ricciardo

Daniel Ricciardo admits that he is yet to fully adapt his driving style to Renault's RS19 car, having suffered a disappointing start to life with the French marque. Ricciardo has collected two DNFs from the opening races of 2019, and also struggled in qualifying.

Although he qualified ahead of team-mate Nico Hulkenberg in Bahrain last time out, Ricciardo has not made Q3 in the opening two rounds of the campaign.

His Australian Grand Prix was ruined before the first corner after running off-track and losing his front wing thanks to a gutter in the verge, while his Bahrain GP ended in a mechanical failure.

His race in Sakhir was not so impressive either, a one-stop strategy failing to lift Ricciardo into the bigger points-paying places, while Hulkenberg was set to finish sixth from 17th on the grid until he was also hit by a mechanical issue.

Having spent five years with Red Bull before departing for Renault this year, Ricciardo says the adjustment process is still ongoing.

"The weekend was a struggle," he told Sky F1. "Just quite a long way off the pace and trying to understand why.

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"For sure some is in me learning the best way to drive the car, trying to maybe get out of some old habits from last year.

"But also a few set-up things and trying to work out what works best for me to build my confidence in this car.

"I don't want to say I'm stuck in my old ways with the Red Bull but for sure this car needs to be tamed a little bit differently. I'm just trying to master that."

The Chinese Grand Prix is next up, scene of a Ricciardo victory last year after fine Red Bull strategy enabled him to carve through the front-runners.

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