Analysis: Ricciardo’s Hamilton-beating form a boost for 2017

For although attention over the final four races may well be dominated by how the Mercedes battle plays out, there are signs of good momentum from Red Bull about what it is delivering at the moment – ahead of a 2017 campaign where it is expected to be back fighting regularly at the front.

In fact, what may have slipped many people’s attention is that in the five races since the summer break, it is Ricciardo and not Hamilton who has emerged as the best points scorer after Rosberg.

Taking into account the results of the Belgian, Italian, Singapore, Malaysian and Japanese GPs – which offers a good indication of form – the points rankings in order are as follows.

Driver	Team	Points
Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	115
Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	79
Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	63
Max Verstappen	Red Bull	50
Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	48
Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	45

In terms of constructors’, the points are:

Team	Drivers	Points
Mercedes	Nico Rosberg Lewis Hamilton	178
Red Bull	Daniel Ricciardo Max Verstappen	129
Ferrari	Kimi Raikkonen Sebastian Vettel	93
Force India	Sergio Perez Nico Hulkenberg	53
Williams	Valtteri Bottas Felipe Massa	28

Of course, Hamilton’s retirement with an engine failure in Malaysia has had a big impact on these scores and would be enough to reverse his and Ricciardo’s position – but there is no denying that Red Bull are chasing Mercedes hard.

Impressive development

Having enjoyed good progress from Renault, and with its RB12 chassis in an aerodynamic sweet spot, Red Bull’s rate of development during the season has been impressive as it has overtaken and pulled clear of Ferrari.

In fact, on the eve of that Malaysia win, Ricciardo said that he felt his Milton Keynes outfit was developing at a better rate than he had ever seen before – and was being helped in part by how much he and Max Verstappen were pushing each other.

“At the level we are maintaining, it is sure helping us in the team,” explained the Australian. “Everything we put on the car, and our feedback may be helping as well, all the updates seem to be going in the right direction.

“Since I’ve been with Red Bull, it’s been the best year for things like that. A lot of things we have used or brought on the car have worked – and we are certainly pushing each other. We are driving at a pretty good level.”

What does it mean for next year?

The fact that Red Bull has got its act together now, could be especially relevant for 2017 – as being on top of its chassis and development progress could be hugely important.

A number of F1 teams have talked about the staggering rate of downforce improvements they are finding with their wind tunnel programmes for the 2017 cars – which means that reaching the limits of what can be delivered with next year’s rules is still some way away.

That also points to a situation where there may be a simple case of the team that started the earliest with its 2017 development may be much further ahead than those that started later.

And although no outfit will confirm exactly when they flicked the switch across to full-on 2017 work, there seems a belief that it was actually Red Bull that committed first.

So with solid delivery of points now helping Ricciardo and Verstappen emerge as Mercedes’ biggest threat; and signals of promise with 2017 plans, excitement levels this winter may well be hard to contain prior to next year's cars hitting the track for the first time.