'It was nice to fight': Daniel pushes through to seventh in Austria’

A week after his race stalled out in Styria, Daniel fought his way to a haul of points in Austria – and rediscovered the fun factor along the way. 

Sometimes the sequel really is better than the original; that was the case for Daniel after last Sunday's Austrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring, where a seventh-place finish for McLaren was a significant step in the right direction after the Styrian GP at the same circuit a week earlier went south.

"It was a fun race, and it was definitely busy the whole time – trying to attack in the first part with the cars ahead on soft tyres, and then defending as hard as I could in the second half," Daniel says.

"So it kept me busy and it was fun, it was nice to fight. I enjoyed being pushed and getting back into the points."

An untimely power glitch left Daniel mired in 13th place for the Styrian weekend, but fast-forward seven days, and his post-race frown was turned upside down. Daniel started from 13th after a tricky qualifying, but aced the getaway and the first lap to climb to 11th before a lap one safety car bunched up the field – and then things really got racy.

Daniel was ninth by lap four and up to fifth as the soft-tyred cars of Pierre Gasly and Yuki Tsunoda (AlphaTauri), along with Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll (Aston Martin), made early pit-stops. Daniel made his own stop on lap 29 to discard his medium tyres for hards until the end of the 71-lap race.

With the faster Red Bull of Sergio Perez and Charles Leclerc's Ferrari piling on the pressure, Daniel resisted as long as he could in fifth, but was passed by Perez on lap 52 before being demoted to seventh just one and a half laps from the end by Ferrari's Carlos Sainz, who had a significant tyre advantage having pitted 19 laps later.

"I actually had no idea I was fifth," Daniel laughs.

"I was so engaged with the battles I was in that I had no idea what position I was in. Fifth would have been huge … it was really the last eight laps where I started to run out of rear tyres with traction, and it was starting to hurt me on braking. With Carlos, I couldn’t do anything once he got within DRS because his tyres were so much fresher.

"From a result point of view, last week definitely could have been sixth or seventh too without the power issue, but we made a step with the car this weekend and with a few of my inputs too so I think it was a better weekend. Didn't look like it in qualifying, I know! But there were some steps made."

Six world championship points brought Daniel's tally for the season to 40, surpassing Gasly for eighth place in the drivers' standings ahead of the next round at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix in a fortnight's time. The site of the first-ever F1 race in 1950 comes with a twist in 2021, with a 17-lap Sprint Qualifying race on the Saturday setting the grid for the Grand Prix proper on Sunday.

It's the biggest shake-up to the sport's format in years, and one that'll be trialled at three races this year. Count Daniel as among the many who's curious to see what transpires.

"I'm excited to have a different format weekend with Silverstone," he says.

"Even something like having two race starts will be fun. I've enjoyed the first laps lately so having one on Saturday and another on Sunday, I'm not against that at all! So, looking forward to it."

For now though, after three races in as many weekends, it's the right time for some well-earned downtime.

"I loved the triple-header for the continuous racing and because you're busy, but once it was done you realised how knackered you were," Daniel says.

"Sunday morning, your third week in a row … you need a little extra caffeine to get you through it. So it's been fun, but mentally you're pretty exhausted. Physically you're not too sore, but mentally you need a rest."