Ricciardo left frustrated by qualifying 'mystery'

Daniel Ricciardo has conceded that his pace disadvantage to RB teammate Yuki Tsunoda during Saudi Arabian Grand Prix qualifying was a "mystery".

Ricciardo failed to find the improvements needed at the end of Q2 and will start 14th on the grid at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, five-tenths slower than Tsunoda in the second part of qualifying.

The Japanese driver progressed to Q3 and qualified ninth, leaving Ricciardo puzzled by the deficit.

"Very frustrating," Ricciardo told media including RacingNews365.

"Last week, I was frustrated just more with myself because I knew there was time on the table and of course, it was never going to be perfect but I knew last week was on me.

"This is honestly a bit more of a mystery. The balance... a few corners where you struggle a little bit here and there but simply in Q2 when everyone's able to find half a second or something, we just plateaued."

'I'm not confident'

Despite not knowing the exact cause of the pace deficit, Ricciardo conceded to a lack of confidence with the VCARB-01.

"I don't even know," replied Ricciardo when asked if he's capable of lapping five-tenths faster than Tsunoda.

"Obviously, you always want to impress whoever's watching, but I think the frustrating thing now is that last week, I made some mistakes, I was frustrated with myself, but confident about where the lap time was.

"Standing here right now, I'm not confident with the car we had, where we could have got it. So that's really all that's on my mind now.

"I'm sure there are some places I can improve, so I'm not saying I'm perfect."