Ricciardo: Naïve to think Red Bull pole is a given

Daniel Ricciardo says it is “naïve” to think the battle for Mexican Grand Prix pole will be a straight shootout between himself and Red Bull Formula 1 teammate Max Verstappen.

Red Bull enjoyed a dominant performance on Friday as Max Verstappen twice topped the timesheets in Mexico City, finishing the day over a second clear of its nearest competitors.

While Red Bull made the most of the high altitude of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriquez circuit - which negates outright engine performance - its rivals Ferrari and Mercedes endured a difficult day, with both teams struggling throughout practice.

Asked if he feels it is a two-horse race for pole position, Ricciardo replied: “If it stays like this, then yeah, it’s between us two, but I don’t want to be naïve.

“I’m sure Ferrari and Mercedes will come on strong tomorrow. We’ll see what happens. I hope they don’t – but I can’t see us being half a second or whatever we are in front of them.

“It could be a close six-way fight for pole. I think that would be pretty exciting. I think the key to a quick time tomorrow is a clean lap.

“It’s still quite slippery around here, and it’s easy to make those mistakes, so probably not overdriving will be helpful.”

Ricciardo insists Red Bull can still improve despite its promising day, particularly in its race simulations.

“I was happy with the low-fuel performance, it was much closer to the pace. The high fuel we seemed off the pace,” he explained.

“I could feel the car wasn’t quite there but we were still more off the pace than we probably though.

“We’ll work on the high fuel, but the low fuel for now doesn’t seem too bad.”