The Infiniti Red Bull Racing outfit had a very difficult race weekend at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, with Daniil Kvyat finishing ninth and Daniel Ricciardo a lowly thirteenth on Sunday.
Kvyat held off the late challenge of Romain Grosjean until the chequered flag, with the Russian driver admitting it was a difficult afternoon in Montreal with the obvious power deficits his Renault-powered car has in comparison to many of his rivals, most noticeably those with Mercedes power.
“It was a tough race because the Mercedes powered cars had a clear advantage over us, but we managed to keep two of them behind us today which is the maximum we could have done,” said Kyvat.
“Two championship points is the best we could have achieved. The team did a good job but we obviously have to improve in many areas including the power unit.”
Team-mate Ricciardo was less fortunate, with the 2014 Canadian Grand Prix winner unable to maintain his position within the top ten, ultimately falling out of contention and finishing thirteenth.
“It’s been a strange weekend for me and I am a little confused about today’s race,” said Ricciardo. “I was lacking pace and we are not sure why.
“There was nothing that felt especially wrong but we just couldn’t get any pace out of the car. I had a few set-up changes compared to Dany but that doesn’t explain the difference in pace. It is something we will look at to understand what the cause was.”
Ricciardo admitted he had no idea where the pace had gone from his car, and saw his afternoon progressively getting worse as more cars found their way past, including that of Carlos Sainz from his former Scuderia Toro Rosso team.
“That was one of those races where I was going round and round, banging my head against a wall,” added Ricciardo to Autosport. “I made a few jokes thinking today would be better, and I didn’t think in my wildest dreams today would end up how it did.
“It was like two years ago to be honest, it was really strange. I had my worst race here in 2013 when I was 15th. [My 2013 team-mate at Toro Rosso] Jean-Eric Vergne was so much quicker than me on the Sunday and we didn’t really have any answers.
“A year later I win, and now I am back where I was in 2013.
“For now I’m smiling because I’m sure something was fundamentally up with the car today. I know I am not a second slower than Daniil and I know I haven’t forgotten how to drive.
“The unfortunate thing is it made the afternoon pretty frustrating. Hopefully it’s something obvious, but we may have to dig a little deeper.”
