Daniel Ricciardo endured a tough race in Barcelona overnight as he finished out of the points in the Spanish Grand Prix. 
  
It was a highly difficult race for the West Australian, who struggled for pace throughout the whole 66-lap affair and finished 12th.  
  
He had a decent start to the weekend, qualifying in the top 10 and even moving up a couple of places in the opening laps of Grand Prix. 
  
However, that’s as good as it for him as he struggled for the rest of the race and once he was out of the top 10, he never really looked like challenging for points again. 
  
Even after multiple pit stops and using different tyres, a confused Ricciardo couldn’t find the pace ending what was a frustrating race for him.  
  
“I thought at the start of the race, it was very, very slow. I thought, okay, maybe, I don’t know, temperatures just got too high or something with the tyres,” Ricciardo said. 
  
“You know, [at] the start you’re obviously fighting cars and maybe things like that can happen. We did a three-stop race, so I have four sets of tyres today and was very, very slow and all of them so not sure. Really, really sad race.” 
  
“Everyone obviously came in the weekend curious, you know, for how they’re going to perform,. And yeah, it’s one of those races that it was so slow that you kind of nearly, it sounds bad to say, but like, I mean, you hope that something was wrong. 
  
“Like you hope that we find something that is like, ‘oh, that’s why’ – because [it’s] probably more concerning if we don’t because, as I said, it wasn’t like a tenth or two tenths off, it felt like over a second at times. 
  
“I don’t know that for a fact, but I certainly saw the cars pass me and pull away very quickly.” 
  
At the front of the field, Max Verstappen rocketed to the top of the championship standings after leading a Red Bull one-two.  
  
With polesitter Charles Leclerc retiring, it left Verstappen to charge to the chequered flag in his third race win for the year. 
  
Mercedes’ George Russell rounded out the podium ahead of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and teammate Lewis Hamilton.  
  
It’s back-to-back rounds for the FIA Formula 1 World Championship with the famous Monaco Grand Prix this weekend.