McLaren a "stretch" to stay in F1 battle at Qatar Grand Prix says Ricciardo
Daniel Ricciardo says McLaren need a strong weekend in Qatar to stay in the fight for third in the F1 constructors' championship.
Daniel Ricciardo says McLaren need better results in Qatar to stay competitive against Ferrari. (Formula One)
The battle was impacted heavily by Ricciardo's retirement in Brazil.
The Australian had finished 34 races in a row until a power failure took him out of the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
"It's a bit more of stretch now for sure,” said Ricciardo.
"It's not over till it is over, but they've really capitalised the last couple of weekends when obviously both of us had first-lap incidents."
"Obviously, the lead car had the first-lap incident, which hurt a lot."
Ferrari leads McLaren in the standings by 31.5 points.
"Looking over the whole season, I think Ferrari's been there from really race one," said Ricciardo.
"They had a few poles as well in that early part."
With just three races remaining, the two teams have everything to race for as one place in the constructors' standings could be worth millions of dollars in prize money.
"We're not definitely conceding yet, but I think we've done well to keep up the fight till now," said the Australian.
"But we'll definitely have to have a better weekend than them if we want any really shot at this.
"We'll just keep doing our thing and hopefully get a few more points than we've had the last couple of weekends."
