Daniel Ricciardo was a frustrated figure after Lance Stroll hit him at the Chinese GP. His anger was understandable, given that a potentially strong result was taken away. Stroll was caught off guard as the Safety Car entered the pits, ramming into Ricciardo and damaging his car. However, more than the incident itself, it was Stroll’s post-race comments that annoyed the Australian.
The eight-time race winner was unhappy that Stroll denied responsibility for the incident. From the perspective of the RB driver, the Canadian failed to accept responsibility for a race-ending collision.
Lance Stroll was asked in today’s press conference if he spoke to Ricciardo about the incident. The 25-year-old responded by saying that such discussions are “not for this room.” This statement leaves plenty of ambiguity and room for interpretation.
Ricciardo moves on from the incident
However, Daniel Ricciardo spoke candidly about the situation. He explained that Stroll is yet to apologise whilst also downplaying the importance of dwelling on the incident:
“I feel it’s not going to go anywhere. I can accept an apology. I’m not that much of an asshole,” motorsport.com quotes as saying.
“But the fact that there’s not even that… He clearly doesn’t think he did anything wrong. So, I guess there’s not much to say.
“Obviously, if we sit next to each other in the drivers’ briefing and he wants to chat, I’m not going to ignore him or anything.”
Ultimately, both drivers will focus on the task ahead this weekend. For Ricciardo, perhaps the most irritating part of last weekend’s clash was that he eventually received a 3-place grid penalty for overtaking Hulkenberg under the Safety Car.
Therefore, his chances of scoring points will be complicated in Miami.
Still, he showed encouraging progress in the VCARB 01 in Shanghai. The Faenza-based team’s changes to his chassis seem to be facilitating improvements – at least for now. Moving forward, the Australian will hope to gather some momentum and get his F1 season underway.
