Daniel Ricciardo "can't believe" he's excited for the French Grand Prix

McLaren

Ricciardo "can't believe" he's excited for the French Grand Prix

Overtaking is often at a premium at Paul Ricard

Sam Hall

Wednesday 16 June 2021 17:41

Daniel Ricciardo conceded he "can't believe" he is excited to visit Paul Ricard for the French Grand Prix with the track's tendency to produce less than exciting racing.

Ricciardo has struggled to get to grips with the McLaren MCL35M since his move from Renault, now Alpine.

The struggles have been exacerbated by two consecutive races on street courses but the Australian is hopeful his fortunes will change on the more forgiving Paul Ricard layout.

Article continues under video

"I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I’m kind of excited to go to Le Castellet and just get obviously a fairly basic track to maybe get away with a few mistakes on," said Ricciardo.

“The kind of familiarity of that and then I guess the double-header in Austria will hopefully make this kind of learning phase a bit easier."

F1 enters its first triple-header of the year

Although the current calendar features four triple-headers, this being the first with the French Grand Prix preceding two races in Austria, there remains doubt over the schedule later on in the year.

The Singapore Grand Prix has already been cancelled leaving a gap in the middle of one of the remaining triple-headers, whilst F1 has previously commented it is monitoring the situation in South America with races currently planned to take place in Mexico and Brazil.

’“We head to France this week to start the first triple-header of the season and I can’t wait to get started," added Ricciardo.

"Three back-to-back races can be seen as a challenge, but it’s also a great opportunity to get continuous time in the car and really build on the progress we’ve made so far.

"Being able to consecutively put more miles in over the next three weekends combined with the work we’ve done in the simulator will hopefully get us to a good place and continue to build my confidence in the car."