Ricciardo says new F1 tyre rules good for the show

In Bahrain,nine different strategies were used by the top 10 finishers, with only Nico Rosberg and Kimi Raikkonen following the same route.

"So far we've had two races this year, and having that extra set of tyres, that extra compound choice, for me it's made it really exciting," said Ricciardo.

"Even throughout practice and qualifying things change, and for the race you can go for different strategies.

"It creates a bit more excitement, it's another factor, another variable for the race, and something else for the driver and team to think about."

Red Bull third

The Australian showed in Bahrain that the Red Bull is the third best car at the moment, earning fourth place after Sebastian Vettel failed to make the start.

"I saw some some smoke out of Seb's car on the warm-up lap, and I knew pretty much immediately that that was his race done. The target was fifth, and it made that fourth, and obviously we finished fourth.

"There was a bit going on in the first corner, I tried to sort of capitalise on that, but I got tangled up in it, and we damaged the front wing.

"I was a bit worried that we'd have to come in and change it – I saw a big part fly off it – but it was not as affected as I thought, and I just carried on. Fourth was a bit lonely at times, but we couldn't expect much more."

At one stage he had a fight with Romain Grosjean, who ran his first three stints on supersoft tyres: "I saw him coming and I was bit surprised about his pace but in the end I knew what strategy he was on, and knew if we just kept it clean fourth was looking good."