“I kissed the wall, I was definitely pushing”: Daniel Ricciardo ‘proud’ of his second-row start at Miami GP Sprint Qualifying

Visa Cash App RB driver Daniel Ricciardo has claimed that he is delighted to finish P4 in the Sprint Qualifying at the Miami Autodrome despite 'kissing the wall' in Turn 16.

The Aussie driver's performance during the session left everyone perplexed as he was constantly ahead of the likes of Lewis Hamilton, Carlos Sainz, Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll.

The VCARB driver was also ahead of his teammate Yuki Tsunoda, who finished a lowly P15 and never had the pace to match the eight-time race winner in the SQ2 session.

Speaking with Sky Sports, Daniel Ricciardo stated that he did not expect to finish on the second row alongside Red Bull's Sergio Perez. He said:

"I know it's in me - but did I expect to do a second-row start? Probably not that good. I felt really good in SQ2 and I knew that lap would be good enough for SQ3. I think at that point I was P5 and in my head, I was thinking 'P5 would be really nice for SQ3' and then we got P4.

"It was wild. The laps were good but it's hard to be really clean around here, it was a tricky track, and it's hard to. On both laps I kissed the wall, I was definitely pushing."

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Daniel Ricciardo 'proud' of his efforts to get P4 in the Sprint Qualifying in Miami

Daniel Ricciardo also stated that he was proud of his performance on the track situated in the Hard Rock Stadium complex.

As quoted by the aforementioned source, the 34-year-old said:

"I'm very proud of what I did today but also the team has been bringing upgrades the last few races. I had the chassis change in China and we had a new floor here, so it definitely looks like it's turning around. It's just so nice starting towards the front."

It would be interesting to see if the P4 in the Sprint Qualifying is an outlier for the VCARB F1 team because they took advantage of some top teams struggling or if their pace around Miami Autodrome is genuine.

Daniel Ricciardo will certainly hope for a good start to keep in line with the leading pack. He will try to keep the faster drivers, such as Carlos Sainz, Lando Norris, and Oscar Piastri, behind him in the Sprint race for as long as possible get some points for the team.