Daniel Ricciardo has described F1's recent triple-header of races as knackering in the wake of the third and final Grand Prix in a row at the Red Bull Ring. With more triple-headers to come later this year, the Australian driver has been talking about the fatiguing effect of the relentless schedule, as the racing series reaches the midway point of its longest-ever season. In 2021, the F1 calendar has 23 Grand Prix events penciled in, which will provide an even greater mental and physical test to the drivers and teams. "I mean it was the same last year and I love staying busy with it, and kind of staying in that routine, but yeah, I'm knackered!" Ricciardo told F1 TV. "Like, it's probably not so much physically, I think we're all pretty conditioned now, especially when you get to drive the car more often. But just like mentally. "Sunday night after the race it's so hard to switch off, so you're not sleeping great and then you're playing catch up. And then Thursday, you're back in and having that three weeks in a row, so you're constantly playing catch up. I need a few good night's sleep" "If it's a good race you're watching replays. If it's a bad race you're, I don't know, going through just smashing up the TV [or] you could punch a hole in a wall somewhere. But anyway, I'm looking forward to just switching off for a few days and resetting a little bit, getting stuff going." The McLaren driver was speaking in the aftermath of last weekend's Austrian Grand Prix, in which he recovered from a poor qualifying performance to finish P7 in Sunday's race. "Today I think I just needed to have a ton of fun. To be honest, the position [P7] somewhat didn't really matter, it was just about getting in some battles and fighting, I think that was the important thing," Ricciardo added.
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