Struggling Ricciardo gets new chassis for Austria

Daniel Ricciardo hopes a new chassis will solve his mysterious lack of performance in the Canadian grand prix.

The Australian struggled to bare his famous wide grin throughout the Montreal weekend as he was comprehensively out-performed by Red Bull teammate Daniil Kvyat.

"I don’t know. It was my worst race," said Ricciardo when asked by Auto Motor und Sport what happened.

"It was like two years ago when (Jean-Eric) Vergne was so much faster than me here and we didn’t know why.

"A year later I won, and now I’m back where I was in 2013.

"I can still laugh because I know that there was something fundamentally wrong with the car," Ricciardo explained. "I’m not a second slower than Kvyat and I haven’t suddenly forgotten how to drive."

He admitted, however, that Red Bull did not immediately find the cause of the problem, but Ricciardo said it is possible there is something wrong with his chassis.

"We will know in Austria," said Ricciardo, "as I am scheduled to get a new chassis there.

"I don’t think that it’s the chassis, as I’ve never been wild with the curbs or hit the wall or anything — there is nothing that could explain that sort of damage."