'You've got to back it up': Ricciardo in the spotlight as McLaren targets Red Bull gap — Miami burning questions
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Sometimes you can have too much of a good thing. Formula 1 has cracked the United States, with three healthy, well-attended and high-profile grands prix sprawled across the country proving that Americans will take to the sport if given the chance. Perhaps they've taken to it too well, however. So intent on claiming a piece of the sport are they, legislators are threatening F1 with legal action if it won't reconsider allowing the all-American Andretti team access to the grid. Every practice, qualifying session and race from the 2024 FIA Formula One World Championship™ LIVE in 4K. New to Kayo? Start Your Free Trial Today > It's not the sort of publicity the sport was hoping for, with plenty going on in the paddock to keep fans interested. CAN RICCIARDO CARRY THE MOMENTUM? Daniel Ricciardo's Chinese Grand Prix ended with a literal high, being punted into the air by an inattentive and unapologetic Lance Stroll behind the safety car, leaving him with irreparable crash damage and on an emotional low. It was frustrating most of all. The Aussie had been enjoying his first genuinely strong weekend of the year and was in with a shot at his first points before the Canadian lost focus. The result left him without conclusive answers on why his form appeared to turn so sharply upwards in Shanghai. He'd just received a new chassis — a belt-and-braces approach to diagnosing his underperformance — but even a couple of weeks earlier in Japan he appeared to be making big steps on single-lap pace. Miami gives him a chance to understand if he's really out of the woods or if China was a false dawn. Ricciardo, for what it's worth, is confident he can keep up the momentum. "Always you've got to back it up," Ricciardo said. "But the feeling inside the car that weekend — really from FP1 everything just felt a bit more conventional, a bit more normal. "Things just came a little bit more effortlessly. That's not taking it lightly, but it just kind of rolled, as I'd probably expected the season to go, which obviously it hadn't really until that point. "I'm very, very excited to be back here at a race and to get in the car. All I want to do is race and compete now. Knowing that we had to wait a week after China — it's nice to have a weekend off, but I just want to be in the car right now." The Aussie will be boosted by upgrades but handicapped by a three-place grid penalty for Sunday, but qualifying is where he's been weakest this year and where he needs to find the biggest gains. This weekend speed is more important than results. Do well and he'll be on the way to reversing the dire narrative around his season, chassis or not. PIT TALK PODCAST: Audi has made its first foray into the driver market by snapping up Nico Hulkenberg from Haas, and Carlos Sainz is widely rumoured to be the team's next target — if Red Bull Racing doesn't get to him first. CAN McLAREN KEEP UP ITS DEVELOPMENT TRAJECTORY? McLaren has been so consistently good for so many months that it's getting easy to forget just how consistently bad the team was this time last year. The 2023 Miami Grand Prix was McLaren's worst race of the year. From a woeful 16th and 19th on the grid, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri trundled home a sad 17th and 19th. It would be a couple more months before a massive upgrade completely changed the team's complexion. Its remarkable development trajectory had it end last season as Red Bull Racing's closest challenger. It hasn't retained that place at the start of 2024, but it hasn't given up hope on its bold pre-season predictions that it can still catch Red Bull Racing. The team's brought its first major upgrade of the year to this weekend's race in Miami in the hope last year's sensational climb can be repeated, this time from a higher base. "It should be a good step forward," Piastri said. "Hopefully it does what it's supposed to do and that would be good. "Trying to stay on the trajectory from last year is what we're aiming to do, but obviously as you get closer and closer to the limit of these cars and these regs, it becomes harder and harder to do, so we'll see. "I think the upgrades we pulled off last year always worked well, so hopefully we can have a similar kind of effect this year." McLaren is seeking some improvements mainly through slower and longer duration corners, where it's had a historical weakness. In high-speed bends it's already competitive with Red Bull Racing. "I think we're getting closer and closer," Piastri added. "I think at points last year we were very close at a couple of tracks, but clearly we're not the well-rounded package that Red Bull is at the moment. "The upgrades this weekend are trying to help us with that, but with the trajectory we've had, if you look at us 12 months ago to where we are now, I think we're in great shape, and hopefully later this year and into next season we can start to start the challenge a bit more." McLaren will have a tough task getting the most from its upgrade kit, though, with Miami running to the sprint format, meaning the team will have just one hour of practice before the first competitive session of the weekend. It's also battling with the idea that Miami may just not suit its car after last year's shocker. It might take until the following round in Imola to confirm, but the parts on display this weekend could be decisive to McLaren's season result. WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT IN THE RED BULL SOAP OPERA? If Formula 1's new-found American appeal really is about Drive to Survive and the dramatisation of the sport, then Miami fans couldn't have hoped for a better setting for their third race. The week has been dominated by news that Adrian Newey has quit Red Bull Racing after almost two decades at the helm of the design office, in which time he's won six constructors titles and built cars that have claimed seven drivers crowns. He's sure to add another of each by the end of the season. Though this has been his most successful stint at any team, the legendary designer is calling time because Red Bull Racing remains engulfed in scandal triggered by a complaint over inappropriate behaviour made against team boss Christian Horner by a female member of staff. Newey has reportedly felt uncomfortable about the way the whole drama has been handled and the subsequent power struggle in which the team is now embroiled. But him leaving is only part of the equation. What will happen to Red Bull Racing without him, and where will he take his decades of experience? Max Verstappen, who has suggested he'll see out his contract to its 2028 end date only if stability is restored to the team, said Newey's departure wouldn't necessarily impact his own future. "Not at the moment," he said, per ESPN. "People are making up a lot of stuff because they don't understand how the roles are in the team, but of course I cannot deny I would have preferred him to stay. "F1 is a shark tank. Everyone thinks about themselves at the end of the day. I know that. I'm not stupid. So that's fine." Reports out of Italy have revealed Newey met Ferrari boss Frédéric Vasseur in London during the week, adding hype to the mouth-watering prospect of him completing Maranello's resurgence just as Lewis Hamilton arrives. And with blood now in the water, you can be sure the eight teams that miss out on Newey's signature will be shaking the Red Bull Racing tree hoping any disaffected members of staff might be willing to follow the F1 legend out the door. "Not ideal," Pérez said. "Someone like Adrian has been tremendous to our team, to our organisation." But he denied that he thought the removal of a key piece would trigger a collapse. "I think everyone is fully committed to the team," he said. "We're having a tremendous season once again. The future looks bright in the team, so I think it's normal that you have this sort of movement with some people." Red Bull Racing could control the narrative to an extent while the sport was out of session. With everyone crammed into the paddock again this weekend, you can be sure this won't simply be the end of it. CAN PÉREZ BANISH HIS MIAMI HOODOO? This could be a pivotal round for Pérez's quest to retain his seat. This time last year Pérez was on a high. He'd beaten Verstappen to two of the opening four victories of the season and admitted he considered himself a title contender. He started on pole in Miami with Verstappen down in ninth after a qualifying red flag. He seemed certain to take the title lead. Then Verstappen charged through field, overtook Pérez easily and beat him by more than five seconds. It shouldn't have been possible in identical machinery. It mentally shattered Pérez, whose form spiralled precipitously from there. He failed to qualify inside the top 10 for the next five grands prix on the hop, and his title hopes were obliterated in less than two months. He returns in similar form — he's a comfortable second in the drivers standings and looking like a good match for his car — but with question marks still over his season. Can he really keep it up, or is this the new-season bounce we've been accustomed to with the veteran? "I think the last few weekends have been good," he said. "We're still in the early stages of the season, so it will be interesting to see where we are relative to everyone else in this place. "Last year qualifying went all right, so I believe that we can be all right here." If he can break the hoodoo, it might be his strongest argument yet for a new deal. WHAT WILL F1 DECIDE ON THE SPRINT FORMAT? Formula 1 has scheduled sprint rounds on back-to-back weekends for the first time, giving the sport a unique chance to gauge the impact of this year's tweaked format. To recap: Friday comprises one hour of practice and then sprint qualifying, Saturday starts with the sprint race and then grand prix qualifying, and the race is on Sunday as usual. There are two key differences compared to last year: the rearranging of the schedule into a logical order and the allowing of teams to make set-up changes after the end of the sprint. There's no doubt the weekend is now easily to follow, but the changes aren't without their detractors. "I have to say, actually, I probably preferred the old format," Valtteri Bottas said. "There was only one practice and the qualifying straight after was for the main race, so there was a bit more at stake. "With the set-up, you wouldn't have the second chance to adjust it, so I liked that a bit before what we had last year." Drivers also seemed put off by having to prepare for qualifying after the sprint race, an unusual arrangement for any motorsport category. "I don't think it's great having a sprint race where you're much slower than a qualifying lap and then straight to quali," Logan Sargeant said. Pérez, however, objected to the changes because of the additional workload it put on mechanics, who are now required to rush potentially major set-up changes in the few hours between the sprint and grand prix qualifying when they'd previously have had Friday night and Saturday morning to get them done — and that's before considering possible crash damage. "I think it's something that we really have to look at it," he said. "It's 24 weekends a season, and with these sprint races I think it's a lot of load on our mechanics. "Whether we … change the format a bit to basically try to look after our people a little bit more as a sport, I think that's something really to look at it. "I would really like that we will be able to review the format because so we are looking after our people in our sport." With the risk of damage much higher around the temporary Miami track than at wide-open Shanghai, there's a good chance at least some mechanics are going to be pushed to their limits this weekend.