JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia – Daniel Ricciardo said he and Yuki Tsunoda have cleared the air following a fiery conclusion to the Bahrain Grand Prix.
After the race had finished, Tsunoda twice drove past his teammate on the cool-down lap in an aggressive fashion, having been upset with RB’s handling of a team orders request in the closing stages.
A bemused Ricciardo later criticised his teammate’s “immaturity.”
During the race Tsunoda had reluctantly obeyed an order to move over to let Ricciardo through for 13th as the team felt he had a better chance of passing Kevin Magnussen ahead, given the strategy he was on. RB did not swap the drivers back afterwards when Ricciardo was unable to get by.
Asked if he and Tsunoda had spoken about it to clear the air, Ricciardo said: “Yes, we did and it was important.
“I think the race situation is something that, obviously, can happen, drivers never like team orders, so if a driver doesn’t react straight away it’s not it’s like the first time that has ever happened. That was all pretty clear, I think it was important for us to talk about that, also to be clear that even if it’s in the heat of the moment, things can have some bigger consequences.
“We talked personally, privately, doors closed, openly, transparently, so it was the right thing to do and we left on Saturday night feeling ‘it’s done’!”
Tsunoda also spoke about the incident in the FIA press conference.
“We are on the same page now and we understand each other,” Tsunoda said. “I was, in the moment, I was a bit heated. I was getting heating moments in my brain.
“But yeah, I still in the end let him through probably a lap later or half a lap later. So that probably that was those things. So in the end, they thought they had more chance and I respect that.”
Tsunoda believes his radio messages get taken out of context on F1 broadcasts.
“I just keep reminding myself just before I jump into the car, no pressing radio. But I think also, probably they [the F1 broadcast feed] love to pick myself on the radio.
“I mean, I’m not as shouty as it looks, in a radio on the TV … The more I say, the worse it’s going to be. I’m just going to say I will just try my best to improve and you will see in the track from this races onwards.”
The controversy presented RB’s new team boss Laurent Mekies with an immediate situation to deal with in his new role.
Mekies, who replaced long-serving team boss Franz Tost ahead of this season, was in his first race leading a team from the pit wall.
Ricciardo was impressed at how he immediately moved to diffuse the situation.
“I was curious to see how it was going to be dealt with, because it’s one of those ones where you don’t realise racecar drivers are stubborn. Yes, we are stubborn, and sometimes we’re like, “Ah, screw this, I’m just walking away, and they’ll deal with it.”
“But I think the fact that we got brought into a room and just talked about it, and it was very calm, it was very composed, it wasn’t no pointing fingers. It was just, ‘let’s talk about this’. So, we know that when we leave this room we feel a lot better about it and know that we go to Saudi with absolutely no hangover or whatever from this little incident. So, that was good.”
Source: www.espn.com