Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo has been left feeling frustrated after Mercedes once again dominated practice for the Spanish Grand Prix.

The race at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya this weekend is the first in Europe this season, and will see the introduction of a number of updates on the cars from every team. As a result, it was seen as an opportunity for Red Bull to cut the significant gap to Mercedes at the front of the field.

However, Ricciardo is still frustrated by Mercedes’ advantage after the German team dominated both practice sessions on Friday in Spain.

“It’s nice not to have gone backwards during the short break and I think we have shown improvement,” he said. “We want to close the gap to Mercedes but they don’t seem to be showing any signs of slowing down! They are a little bit far away.

“I hoped we would probably close the gap a bit more,” he continued. “Today was too far. We are trying to pull them back, but we seem to be in a solid third place today.

“It would be nice to fight for a win soon, but for now it seems that thirds are the best we can do.”

Red Bull’s efforts were not helped by a problem on Sebastian Vettel’s car that meant the defending Formula 1 world champion could complete just four laps on Friday.

“It’s not great that Seb wasn’t running,” Ricciardo said. “Two cars means twice the amount of feedback for the team and you don’t learn so much from one when you are trying new parts, but at least we got some good data. The short runs and long runs were both okay today.”

Barring a mechanical problem or an on track incident, it is difficult to see Mercedes being stopped this weekend. However, Ricciardo is doing all that he can to put himself in a position to pick up the pieces should disaster strike for the Silver Arrows.

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