Motorsport Musings Ramblings of a racing enthusiast…

The case for Daniel Ricciardo

Well it’s fast approaching that time of year again. As another gripping season of motor racing reaches its climax, Autosport (or should that be: AUTOSPORT) are beginning to collate votes for their annual awards ceremony, held this year on December 6.

Choosing your candidate for any of the eight categories on offer largely comprises of massacring your copy of AUTOSPORT and following an origami master class before running the Royal Mail gauntlet.

British F3 trailblazer - Ricciardo

The notion of being able to cast your vote online hasn’t been lost on them entirely though. They have selected ten drivers for us to choose from in their ‘Rookie of the Year’ category and I’m going to make your decision process that little bit easier by suggesting you select this year's British F3 winner Daniel Ricciardo.

The Formula Renault Eurocup graduate was the latest of Red Bull’s Antipodean prodigies, whose ties with the energy drinks giant brought the potent VW back to British F3 in direct competition with Mercedes-Benz.

Driving for the championship’s top team Carlin Motorsport, Ricciardo emerged as the pre-season favourite despite his rookie status. The Aussie racer did not fail to disappoint as he was the class of the field from the first race of the season and clinched the title with a round to spare, becoming the first Australian driver to win the championship since David Brabham, 20 years ago.

Most title-winning seasons are founded from a strong start and Ricciardo’s was no different, scoring a brilliant double win at Oulton Park and followed it up with another win at Silverstone. It immediately became apparent that there would be nobody to touch the 20-year-old this year, despite the best efforts of Hitech Racing drafting in Renger van der Zande who ran as wing-man to Walter Grubmuller. Once Ricciardo had dominated his tyre issues mid-season, he was unstoppable, achieving five poles in the last 10 races, winning three of the last eight and wrapping up the title with a round to spare.

Some may question the 87-point margin by which he clinched the title and that his runaway success in the series was due to a lack of competition from the rest of the field. But the figures speak for themselves. Six wins, six poles – you can’t really take anything away from Ricciardo being consistently good at his trade. If anything it was up to his rivals to improve and to work harder to try and catch him, and they failed.

Does his dominance in British F3 make him any more worthy than the other nominees in the category? Well I think he just about pips Kris Meeke to the award, who enjoyed an impressive season during which he showed an abundance of speed and consistency to clinch the IRC title with a round to spare. The difficulty here is trying to compare drivers from different racing series, but it could be suggested Meeke has more experience under his belt than that of Ricciardo, and so the British F3 driver's achievements are more impressive as a result.

His great raw speed and excellent temperament coupled with his Red Bull backing means Ricciardo is destined for bigger and better things (he is likely to test with the F1 team during the off-season) and winning the Rookie of the Year category would top-off an amazing year for the Australian, giving him the recognition he fully deserves.

Vote for your Autosport Rookie of the year here.