Daniel Ricciardo believes Sunday’s United States Grand Prix could be a “lottery” due to the wet weather affecting Austin.
Persistent rain disrupted running during Friday’s two practice sessions at the Circuit of the Americas, with slick tyres unable to be used.
Tyre restrictions meant Daniel Ricciardo did not run at all in FP2, having picked up a puncture on a set of his wet tyres in FP1 earlier in the day.
Wet weather is due to strike the area on Saturday but current forecasts indicate that Sunday will be dry, meaning drivers could head into the race without any running on slick rubber.
“I think we’re looking alright,” said Ricciardo, who was fourth in FP1, behind the Mercedes drivers and Red Bull team-mate Max Verstappen.
“It seemed decent this morning, the first few laps we did. Then in the dry, who knows. I think it will be a lottery on Sunday for the race.
“I don’t know if Ferrari had struggles or whatever, but we looked to be….podium, we’ll try and target that.”
On his absence in the afternoon session, Ricciardo confirmed: “The tyres we used this morning, we would have used for the afternoon, but I picked up a puncture.
“Anything we used now would have taken away from qualifying it’s wet. Qualifying is more important which is why we want to have all the tyres available.”
