“It just needs more care” - Ricciardo suggests changes after Vegas concerns
Friday practice in Las Vegas was heavily disrupted by a number of loose water valve covers around the track.
It meant FP1 was cancelled after just eight minutes, while second practice didn’t start until 2:30am local time (2.5 hours later than scheduled).
Carlos Sainz and Esteban Ocon sustained significant damage from the aforementioned manholes, resulting in chassis changes ahead of FP2.
Speaking after yesterday’s running, Ricciardo felt that more needed to be done in preparation of street events due to the unique nature and challenges they bring given that they happen on public roads.
“It’s easy to say now, like, we did an opening ceremony and were kind of focused on other things; did they do their due diligence on the track?” Ricciardo said.
“With all that obviously happened today, yeah, you could ask them [the FIA] questions like did they do enough? That one, for sure, I can’t sidestep that one. That is a safety concern.
“Us being here late, that’s fine, but I think the safety one is something hopefully they take pretty seriously. Obviously, it’s happened in, I think, Monaco and Baku as well, so it’s obviously a street circuit thing.
“Permanent circuits have a certain criteria, or whatever, and a lot of boxes to tick, and I feel like street circuits need a few more. It just needs more care, and it’s hard when I guess it’s opening to the public but they obviously need to do that.”
Ricciardo believes Sainz was fortunate to come away from his run over the manhole without “bigger consequences”.
“Obviously, we’re like ‘yeah, it’s a late day’ and all that, but obviously two cars got ruined,” he said.
“And along with that, obviously there’s a financial thing there for the teams, which is obviously a big issue for them, but then you brought up the biggest thing, which is safety.
“Fortunately, Carlos is okay, but those things could be greater – when I say greater, obviously [I mean] bigger and bigger consequences.”
