Helmut Marko claims Red Bull Racing intend to promote Daniel Ricciardo – Formula 1 news
Red Bull Racing team’s motorsport advisor Helmut Marko has recently revealed that the team intends to promote Daniel Ricciardo who is currently driving for Hispania Racing Team.
“If he is doing well, the intention is there, yes,” said Marko when asked whether Ricciardo is a candidate for a race seat at RBR in the future.
According to a recent statement by Marko, Mark Webber will retire in 2012 and he is most likely to be replaced by a young driver like Ricciardo. On the other hand, RBR’s team principal Christian Horner has stated that Webber’s retirement is still uncertain
and that the team is not thinking about its future beyond 2012 right now.
Daniel Ricciardo on the other hand has been performing fairly well and he claims that he is improving with each race.
“I hope there is a bit more to come because I'm close to Tonio on raw pace in qualifying but still not close enough, and definitely not a bit ahead, which of course is where I'd like to be,” he said.
The team has almost closed the deal with the Australian driver for the 2012 Formula 1 season and according to some reports, it has been revealed that signing a deal is the only formality left now.
Other than that, the team has revealed that they are keen to sign a driver from their junior team Toro Rosso and that is their first priority.
Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi are driving for the team currently as their full season drivers and one has to admit that filling the shoes of a driver like Mark Webber is not going to be easy for any driver.
RBR are the best team on the track at the moment according to the statistics and they want potential world champions rather than just ‘good drivers.’ Both Alguersuari and Buemi are good but not good enough.
If the reigning world champions want, they can even sign a driver like Lewis Hamilton but obviously, the team wants a good pair rather than just two drivers in the team for the future.
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