Ricciardo doesn’t expect to lose power unit

2015 Australian Grand Prix

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Daniel Ricciardo expects he will be able to re-use the power unit which had to be replaced after today’s first practice session.

As drivers can only use four power units this year, losing one at such an early stage would be a significant setback.

“A problem with the ICE [internal combustion engine] meant we couldn’t run in FP2, but it’s a problem that we can fix for tomorrow<" said Ricciardo. "There’s a lot of time to do what we need, so there’s no concerns – it wasn’t worth rushing it to get five laps this afternoon. We don’t believe it will affect one of the four engines, so it’s not a massive shot in the foot." Ricciardo only completed nine laps in the first practice session, leaving him on the back foot ahead of his home race. "I will look at what Daniil [Kvyat] learnt in FP2 to get a direction for tomorrow,” he said. “The circuit felt pretty rubbered in already in the morning so I should be able to get up to speed tomorrow.”

“I’ve got to get these ants out of my pants now – I’m hanging out to drive! It’s been a bit of a tease all week, talking about driving, and now I just want to get out there.”

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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12 comments on “Ricciardo doesn’t expect to lose power unit”

  1. Autosport reports he has lost first engine and on to his second ICE.

      1. @stretch He may have said something similar in that but the quote in the article above was supplied by Red Bull.

      2. @stretch and @keithcollantine I think we have to wait for morning to see how this works out. Dan was optimistic, Marko was pessimistic and Autosport may have been premature. For competition’s sake, I hope Daniel is not left with three engines for the entire season. Red Bull normally fixes whatever is lacking in their car and it would be a shame to have them handicapped so early in the season.

        1. Could be a trend that the senior Red Bull driver gets the gremlins. First DC, then Webber, then Vettel, now RIC… :)

  2. Marko mentioned after FP2 that the ICE is a goner. So I don’t think that it’s certain either way.

  3. Damn these “internal combuation engine” can be tricky ;-)

  4. petebaldwin (@)
    13th March 2015, 10:14

    Well that’s a great start from Renault! 100 sessions to take part in this year (FP1, FP2, FP3, Q, R x 20) and they’ve blown one of them in the 2nd session! Only 98 to go!

    1. @petebaldwin I will admit, this made me laugh

  5. Someone help me out: Do the teams still use race engines on Fridays?
    I assumed the reason to let them escape being caught by the engine limit was to allow free Friday running?

    1. The Teams in Australia will use the Race engine on friday as it will be their 1st engine for what ever season.
      then from Malaysia they will start switching the engines to and fro and trying to keep fresh engines for the last phases by using the already used engine at races.

      1. Thanks @harsha
        Didn’t take time to understand that rule. Thought the engines they used on Fridays weren’t raced.

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