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Ricciardo’s drive around the Red Bull Ring came against the backdrop by renewed criticism from Dr. Helmut Marko, who had questioned the Australian’s place at RB.
In this week’s Pirtek Poll, we want to know if you agree with Marko, and believe the eight-time race winner should be replaced by Liam Lawson, of if he’s done enough to earn another year.
Ricciardo is the only one of Red Bull’s four F1 race drivers without a contract for 2025.
That’s the result of an up and down start to the year that saw him comprehensively out-performed by Tsunoda in the early races.
The Japanese driver has been in fine form, though even he admits Ricciardo has been a positive influence; changing set-up and development direction of the team and generally pushing him forward.
It hasn’t all been bad news for Ricciardo though.
In China there were signs of a turnaround, coinciding with the arrival of a new chassis, and his performance in the Sprint sessions in Miami was remarkable.
Clearly, the pace and ability remain, the battle is unlocking those things consistently.
Ricciardo has admitted as much himself in honest self appraisals that, at times, have sounded worryingly like the defeated figure he cut in his second season at McLaren.
Following the Monaco Grand Prix he had some difficult conversations with his inner circle and his engineers.
That sparked an improved performance in Canada, where he stayed out of trouble to finish eighth and record his first points of the season.
Spain was disappointing in terms of the race outcome, but that was more owing to the team’s desire to push through upgrades early.
It led to a weekend where both Ricciardo and Tsunoda battled with an unruly car that was a long way from where it should have been, through no fault of their own.
Even still, Ricciardo saw the flag ahead of his team-mate and considered it a positive performance, if not a good result.
The fallout of that event flowed on into Austria last weekend where RB effectively back-to-backed its two cars in the sole hour of practice with a view to understanding the upgrades better.
It was a decision that largely sacrificed the Sprint, but saw positive steps come the grand prix on Sunday.
Ricciardo was able to capitalise, running a two-stop strategy that gave him track position and saw him rise from 11th (he was just 0.015s away from a Qualifying 3 appearance on Saturday) to ninth in the race.
The two points that earned him and the team were important, but arguably what the performance signally was worth far more.
It was the third race in a row where Ricciardo was satisfied with his performance, a short but important run of confidence-boosting consistency.
As the driver market continues to move, that form has come at an important time as Lawson waits impatiently in the wings.
The question is; has Ricciardo now done enough to secure his future, or has the damage already been done? Let us know your thoughts in this week’s Pirtek Poll.
