Daniel Ricciardo cautiously praises McLaren progress after Austria practice

Despite finishing both Friday practice sessions outside of the top ten, Daniel Ricciardo has cautiously praised the progress of the McLaren F1 team in Austria.

Daniel Ricciardo on Friday at the Austrian Grand Prix. (Supplied)

“It’s been an interesting day – from the classification it doesn’t look like a good day, but we actually made some progress in a few areas," said Ricciardo.

"We’ll just try to make another step tomorrow and maybe that puts us in the fight."

"If I didn’t know the classification, I’d be more optimistic with the day, but I think just some fine-tuning is needed."

Teams had a lot of variables to deal with in Friday running, with cooler conditions than last weekend's Styrian Grand Prix, as well as a test run of prototype Pirelli tyres.

The Australian was twelfth fastest in FP1, while teammate Lando Norris was tenth.

In FP2 Ricciardo could only manage fifteenth, while Norris was ninth.

"We’ll keep chipping away to find a few more tenths overnight and I think that’ll put us where we need to be." he said.

"We’ve got some work to do, but we’re looking alright.”