The 2024 Bahrain Grand Prix gave us a lot of insight into the teams and their grid hierarchy. However, we never expected the season opener to give us a glimpse into a brewing intra-team rivalry. We are talking about the two men who are pitted against each other for the same seat. We are talking about the Visa Cash App RB men, Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda. It has been brewing in the background ever since Daniel Ricciardo moved into the adjacent garage in Red Bull’s recruitment team, even though the Visa Cash App RB is trying to change that narrative. However, the fact remains that both drivers are fighting for the up-for-grabs second Red Bull seat. Now the new boss Laurent Mekies has added a pinch of salt to this Cold War by confessing Ricciardo is a “reference point” for Tsunoda.

We would’ve not seen Mekies’ statement on the latest episode of the F1: Beyond the Grid podcast as such if I hadn’t been for the post-race incident of the Bahrain GP where Tsunoda let his frustrations get the best of him. The same incident that stemmed from the team orders made Ricciardo confess, “I’m being very sensible right now, but let’s call it immaturity.” Now, fanning the fire, the boss has made Ricciardo the de facto leader.

Mekies said, “Yes, we still have a target to grow our drivers. It’s fantastic, in the way we are evaluating Yuki, the way we’re trying to grow Yuki to have Daniel with him. It gives us a fantastic reference point. Therefore for us, it’s as good as it gets to have the experience and the speed of Daniel, to have the raw speed and the use of Yuki. He has been surprising the F1 world every single year.”

Yuki Tsunoda Reveals “Strange” Experience With Daniel Ricciardo Amid Fight for Red Bull Seat

We are not sure how the Japanese driver will take his new boss’s comments. However, the biggest criticism toward Tsunoda has always been his inability to control his emotions and the tendency to give in to his temper, which, whether he would agree or not, affects his output on the track. So perhaps Mekies is right about Ricciardo being the reference point. The Australian certainly has the experience. However, Peter Windsor believes Tsunoda still has the talent to beat him.

Peter Windsor levies huge praise for Yuki Tsunoda while giving Daniel Ricciardo a reality check

The Australian became the favorite to secure the second Red Bull seat after he got the nod for the then-AlphaTauri seat. Despite being in a prime position to move to Red Bull, the Australian hasn’t really convinced so far. To be fair, he also has suffered some setbacks in the past 6 months.

On the other hand, his rival for the seat and his current teammate proved his worth with an incredible performance in the penultimate race of the 2023 season. Tsunoda was absolutely brilliant during the 2023 Abu Dhabi GP and there’s no other way to describe it. It was his performance on the Yas Marina Circuit that made Peter Windsor give Ricciardo a reality check.

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He said, “Yuki Tsunoda, excellent job for AlphaTauri. He really showed up Daniel Ricciardo around Abu Dhabi. Why? I mean that’s the question. This should be a good circuit for Daniel Ricciardo. And the car is obviously good.  But Yuki Tsunoda, all over him, so all credit to him. He kept up that pace all throughout qualifying as well. Daniel didn’t make it out of Q2 when he was 0.2 slower than Tsunoda.”

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The Japanese driver earned a lot of brownie points with the performance. However, he now has competition from Ricciardo to deal with who has received the vote of confidence from the team boss.