Daniel Ricciardo is set to serve a grid penalty in Canada as a consequence of the power unit issue which nearly ruined his chances of winning the Monaco Grand Prix.
Ricciardo clung on to win in Monaco despite suffering a significant loss of engine power, caused by an issue with the MGU-K component, which harvests energy from the rear under braking and deploys it on straights. The Australian was already on his second MGU-K of the season after suffering an engine issue during practice for the Chinese Grand Prix.
F1’s stricter engine rules for 2018 have limited the components each driver can use per season and Ricciardo’s issue in Monaco has forced Red Bull to take his third MGU-K for Montreal, which automatically generates a 10-place grid penalty. Further changes to other components could escalate the severity of the penalty further up until race day.
Red Bull technical guru Adrian Newey confirmed the news to Reuters, saying: « He will definitely be taking some penalties in Montreal, we haven’t heard at the moment just how many.
« One of things there is whether the battery was damaged or not in Monaco, so until we know that from Renault we don’t know exactly what we’re facing. The [MGU-] K is definitely a penalty. »
Ricciardo’s penalty coincides with a key weekend for Red Bull’s engine supplier. Renault is introducing an upgrade for the Montreal race, but it is unclear how many engines whether the new engines will be introduced for the company’s six cars — its own factory team and its customers, Red Bull and McLaren.
Red Bull appears to be edging towards a switch to Honda power for 2019. Like the other two engine manufacturers, Honda will also be bringing an upgrade to the power-sensititve Montreal circuit.
http://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/23700624/daniel-ricciardo-set-canadian-gp-grid-penalty
