Red Bull suffered a nightmare race in Bahrain as both its drivers retired during the opening laps which Daniel Ricciardo described as the "harsh reality" of motorsport.
The Australian was in fourth place chasing Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen when he lost power, forcing him to pull off the circuit and retire.
Ricciardo suspects an electrical issue was to blame.
"It’s hard, hard when it happens so early. I was fired up, when it’s a night race you’ve got the whole day to think about the race, trying to hold everything in for race time, and after two minutes it’s over.
![Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri [McLaren] celebrate their 1-2 finish at the 2025 F1 Austrian GP](https://www.motorsportweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Lando-Norris-Oscar-Piastri-McLaren-F1-2025-1-120x86.webp)
"I lost all power, seemed like a battery or electrical power – everything switched off, couldn’t do anything. No reason at the moment, but a harsh reality of our sport sometimes, I love it, then I hate it.
"There was no warning, first thing I felt into Turn 8 was the brake pedal, the BBW, you lose the power, brake goes long and I looked at the screen and everything went off. I knew straight away, I couldn’t change gears, yeah…"
Ricciardo believed Red Bull had the pace to challenge for the race win, which made the DNF even more painful.
"Frustrating for everyone because we genuinely felt like we had a good car coming into the race; really believe our race car was better.
"Only did a lap and half, could see Kimi in front, looked like he was already sliding on the rears, felt like we were in with a chance."
![Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri [McLaren] celebrate their 1-2 finish at the 2025 F1 Austrian GP](https://www.motorsportweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Lando-Norris-Oscar-Piastri-McLaren-F1-2025-1-350x250.webp)
