It's the closing laps of the 2014 italian Grand Prix in early September, and Australian Daniel Ricciardo is demonstrating why he has the formula one world buzzing and why he could step out of the shadow of Mark Webber to become our greatest motor-racing talent yet.

As the laps run out at Monza, one of the fastest racetracks on the planet, Ricciardo is desperate to get past his Red Bull teammate, Sebastian Vettel, to claim fifth place.

He has already passed legends such as Spain's Fernando Alonso, Britain's Jenson Button and Finland's Kimi Räikkönen, but Vettel is no easy-beat; the German is the four-time reigning world champion and one of the most successful drivers in the history of the sport.

Ricciardo closes in on Vettel at the end of Monza's main straight, hitting 350km/h and diving to the outside before slamming on the brake pedal to slow to just 55km/h for the tight corner.

Vettel knows his young teammate is right behind him and frantically tries to defend his position, moving his car to the inside line, a classic racing manoeuvre designed to force Ricciardo to go around the outside. Ricciardo stays behind as they exit the first corner, but knows he has Vettel on the ropes.

As they accelerate to 300km/h through a sweeping bend, the German covers the inside line for the next tight corner. Thinking he has blocked his teammate out, Vettel moves back to the outside of the track to take the fastest line through the corner.

But Ricciardo is expecting him to do just that, and dives down the inside at the last second, sneaking past Vettel. He may only snare fifth place in this grand prix but Ricciardo's overtaking manoeuvre - a risky strategy demanding precision, determination and intelligence - underlines the young Australian's potential.

Australia hasn't produced a world champion for-mula one driver since Alan Jones in 1980. Daniel Ricciardo may just be the man to change that. The 25-year-old is now riding high on the back of a breakout 2014 season that has included wins at the Canadian, Hungarian and Belgian grands prix.

Daniel Ricciardo is a few minutes' late for our early-morning interview in the plush, wood-panelled cigar bar of the Grand Hotel Vienna, a 144-year-old neo-classical pile in the middle of the Austrian capital.

He apologises, blaming a flat iPhone battery, a symptom of a schedule that has seen him zip between three countries in three days (Monaco on Monday, England on Tuesday and Austria on Wednesday), then adds that he's skipped breakfast in order to be here.

Late or not, it's impossible to be grouchy with Ricciardo (which he pronounces Ricardo, not Rit-char-do), once he flashes that white, wide, engaging smile.

He isn't physically imposing - at 180 centimetres tall, he weighs a feather-light 68 kilos - but this is perfect, given that drivers need to weigh as little as possible to squeeze every ounce of speed out of the car.

And he's very fit, hitting the gym twice a day. The rest of his training consists of honing his razor-sharp reflexes on bicycles daily with fellow racing drivers in the hills around his home in the south of France.

He is unshaven and dressed in standard garb: polo shirt, jeans and sneakers. Except this isn't any old polo shirt, but an Infiniti Red Bull Racing team shirt, smothered in sponsors' logos.

Add the luxury labels on his jeans, shoes and watch and he looks a little like a walking billboard. Still, without the financial muscle of the Austrian energy-drink company, Ricciardo would have found it next to impossible to break into formula one, such are the stratospheric costs.

He reportedly earns a salary of $1.1 million per season from his team, which is modest by F1 standards - Vettel reportedly takes home $31 million each year.

But his earnings are boosted by a $14,000 bonus for every point he scores in the world championship; after the Japanese Grand Prix earlier this month, with four races still to go, he'd amassed 193 points to earn himself more than $2.7 million in bonuses.

It's a lot of money, but it doesn't stop Ricciardo being the best-value grand prix driver of 2014 based on results per dollar spent.

The recent bonuses have allowed Ricciardo to move from England to an apartment in glamorous Monte Carlo, which he shares with his long-time girlfriend Jemma Boskovich, a jewellery designer who splits her time between Monaco and Perth.

In keeping with his laid-back Aussie approach to being a racing star, he doesn't expect her to come to every race and "be seen".

"I'm trying not to drag her away too much," he says. "She'll come to a couple of races, but not a whole lot. Some drivers [have their girlfriends] there in the pit box with all the cameras. I'm not saying that's a problem, but we're a little bit more discreet. She respects that it's my environment, it's my workplace."

It's the same with his family. While most young drivers have their father with them at every race, Joe and Grace Ricciardo make the occasional appearance at races in Europe, but otherwise leave their son to pursue his career.

Ricciardo's three wins in his first season with Red Bull this year would have been considered good, but not great; last year, by comparison, Vettel won 13 of the 19 grands prix on his way to his fourth world title in as many seasons.

But this year, the world champions have been caught out by a new rules package that has ended, at least temporarily, years of Red Bull dominance and handed the advantage to the Mercedes-AMG team.

The new rules replace the naturally aspirated 2.4-litre V8 engines the teams have used for almost a decade with smaller, 1.6-litre turbocharged V6 engines. Mercedes got the jump on the competition because it builds both car and engine at its English racing facilities, while Red Bull builds its car in England but its engines at Renault's French factory.

The French engine isn't as powerful as the Mercedes, and it was short on reliability during pre-season testing. Initially it looked as though Ricciardo had spent the last decade of his life working towards a seat with a top formula one team, only to discover the top team was on its way down.

It's a common curse in the fickle world of formula one, which is as much about getting your timing right off the track as on.

Take, for example, the case of Mexican young gun Sergio Perez, who in 2013 was plucked from the middle-of-the-pack Sauber team after some giant-killing performances and thrust into the once all-conquering McLaren team. 

But McLaren endured one of its worst seasons in history and Perez was back to the minnow teams by season's end.

"Back in February, I thought a little bit about when Perez joined McLaren - you finally get a top seat but then it's not just their year," Ricciardo admits.

"I really hoped it wasn't something like that. But in February it looked pretty grim. I knew we'd always get better and I thought we'd have a shot at the end of the year if things worked out. But at round seven [the Canadian GP], I didn't expect it to work out and stand on the top step. So it was pretty awesome."

Ricciardo won't endure the same fate as Perez. Not only has he won three grands prix, he's also comprehensively outperformed his teammate, Vettel.

In all forms of motor racing, the first person you have to beat is your teammate. Vettel may only be 27, but he is already a four-time world champion.

He has won 39 grands prix, making him the fourth most successful driver in the history of the sport, behind only Michael Schumacher, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna.

Vettel had also shown himself to be a master politician, carefully moulding the Red Bull Racing team around his needs - at the expense of his teammate, Australia's Mark Webber.

The climax of their five strained seasons together occurred at the 2013 Malaysian Grand Prix, when the Red Bull team ordered the pair to hold their positions when running first and second, with Webber heading for what should have been a grand prix win.

Vettel decided to ignore instructions, attacked the unsuspecting Webber and stole the race. Afterwards, the team was reluctant to publicly criticise Vettel for ignoring their instructions, leaving Webber - and Australian formula one fans - seething.

Throughout their time as teammates, Webber struggled to get the same off-track support from key Red Bull players that Vettel enjoyed and so failed to match the German's on-track results.

That was not the case in the intra-team battle between Vettel and Ricciardo, the Australian comprehensively out-performing the German, both in qualifying and the races. At the time of going to print, with four races still to be run, Vettel is yet to win a race in 2014.

About the only person not surprised by the balance-of-power shift in the Red Bull Racing garage is Ricciardo himself. Heading into the season, he knew the new engine regulations for 2014 would reduce Vettel's advantage, and give him a chance to turn the tables on the Germany versus Australia Red Bull battle.

Vettel was a master of the old V8-engined cars, Red Bull developing the critical aerodynamic package around his particular style of driving.

Ricciardo knew that if he could set some quick times early on, he could get an early psychological advantage on Vettel.

"They had to give me an equal chance because I'd shown some speed in the past, even though Seb had been dominant the last few years," he explains.

"I basically came in and the team were good; from day one they said, 'You are going to get 100 per cent equality. Just go out there and if you can win, go and win.' And that's pretty much the approach I've had - just get behind the wheel, don't focus too much on Seb, just try to learn from him, but don't dwell on the fact he's 'team leader', 'four-time champion' etcetera, etcetera."

His plan worked. At the recent Japanese Grand Prix, Vettel shocked the F1 world by announcing he was quitting the Red Bull team and joining Ferrari in 2015.

The German claims the move is all about a new challenge, but it is hard to escape the feeling, at least on some level, that Vettel has been intimidated by Ricciardo's dominance over him this season.

Next year Ricciardo's partner will be 20-year-old Russian rookie Daniil Kvyat, promoted from Red Bull's second-tier Toro Rosso team, making the young Australian the team's leading driver.

Driving at obscenely fast speeds seems to run in Ricciardo's family. His father, Joe, was born in Sicily and, after emigrating with his family to Australia in 1960, aged eight, started a successful earthworks company in his adopted Perth, which financed his interest in racing, including competitions at the local Wannaroo circuit.

It was here that Joe's infant son, watching his dad race around that track, received his introduction to the sport.

At first Joe tried to steer his only boy away from motor racing, encouraging him to pursue other, far less dangerous sports like tennis and soccer, but it was futile.

"I was addicted to going fast, finding the big hills on the pushbike," Daniel recalls. "It was just something I enjoyed a lot - things with wheels. I used to go to work with dad on the weekend. We'd drive past an indoor go-kart track every now and then and we went there a few times.

''I was never tall enough, so I always left upset. I think I was seven when I was the right height and I was like, 'Please let me have a go.' It was love at first sight."

The next step was to beg his parents for a go-kart of his own, which led to high-speed races at the age of nine and, eventually, national karting prizes. By his 15th birthday, Daniel Ricciardo knew what he wanted - a career in racing.

Although he managed to finish his schooling at Perth's Newman College, Ricciardo admits he wasn't academically inclined.

"I enjoyed physical education and lunch time," he recalls. "The social aspect of school was great, but as soon as I left school I wanted to get out there and race. I couldn't sit still for long."

Joe believed in his son deeply enough to spend the money - more than $100,000 - to get him into car racing. So, as a 16-year-old and still living in Perth, Ricciardo began racing cars in the Formula BMW Asia series, flying to races in Malaysia, China, Indonesia and Thailand.

He won two races in his rookie season and finished third in the championship, enough to earn him a place at the prestigious Formula BMW World Finals, an end-of-season event that brings together the best drivers from the various Formula BMW series around the world.

Held at the Valencia circuit in Spain, the event was Ricciardo's first race in Europe, taking him one step closer to his formula-one dream.

He finished fifth in the 35-strong field, the best performance by a driver from the Asian series and earning him the Outstanding Achievement Award from the organisers.

One keen observer that weekend was Rob Margeit, now editor of Auto Action. Margeit introduced himself to the Australian representative and immediately noticed an attitude and ability that marked him out as someone to watch.

"I spent a lot of time in the garage with Daniel that weekend, where he was part of a five-car team," Margeit remembers.

"What stood out was how seriously he took it. I mean, this was a 16-year-old kid having the time of his life, but also with one eye on the future. While his teammates were having a bit of a party, Daniel was talking to engineers, walking the track, just trying to learn everything he could. He really impressed me.

"I came back to Australia and started telling anyone who would listen that we had someone special on our hands, someone who was good enough, if he applied himself enough, to make it to formula one."

The next step was a permanent move to Europe, so in 2007 Joe and some family friends dug deep to fund a drive in the Italian Formula Renault 2.0 series (Formula Renault being a similar but slightly faster version of Formula BMW).

Although Ricciardo won't reveal how much it cost his father and friends, budgets for the series reportedly run to more than $300,000 a season.

Ricciardo was still only 17, and was now living away from home for the first time in his life, on the other side of the world.

He wasn't based in Rome or Milan; instead he found himself living in a small apartment in the tiny town of Vidigulfo, in northern Italy. "I typed it into Google and this town pretty much didn't come up, that's how small it was."

Despite his father's heritage, Ricciardo wasn't fluent in the local language and he didn't have a television or internet at home. "For modern-day things, it was roughing it for a kid who grew up in Perth," he laughs.

Coming from a large and close-knit Italian family (he says there were 80 relatives at Christmas lunch last year), it was a major adjustment.

He found himself living alone, with all of the temptations that being a racing driver brings, but also with the pressure of knowing that his family and friends had invested much of their savings in his career.

It's a common theme for many young Australian drivers: knowing their families have sacrificed a great deal, knowing they probably have only one shot at this, and working doubly hard as a result.

"All the European drivers [don't have to work as hard], some of them still live at home with their families. It's something you can't describe ... it takes a lot of commitment."

Ricciardo's father and friends had scraped together enough money for one season, but a second season, in a bigger category where he'd have a better chance of his talent being spotted, was looking unlikely.

To step up to the next rung of the ladder, European formula three racing, would require close to $900,000.

What Ricciardo needed was to get picked up by one of the driver-development programs run by the F1 teams from their seemingly limitless budgets.

Red Bull has the biggest, flashiest junior team and it is the one most young drivers want to be a part of.

All of Red Bull's motor racing activities are overseen by Dr Helmut Marko, a grand prix and sports-car driver in the 1970s whose career was cut short when a rock pierced his helmet visor and permanently blinded him in his left eye.

A no-nonsense Austrian, Marko runs the Red Bull junior driver team with a stern, uncompromising efficiency.

The scheme has had more failures than success stories, but Marko's ruthlessness in cutting drivers has put an onus on young drivers who get results.

The program's star graduate is Vettel, the only product of the academy to win the formula one world title.

Although Ricciardo hadn't won a race in Formula Renault in 2007, his performances were enough to catch the eye of Marko and his Red Bull scouts.

Ricciardo was invited to an end-of-year try-out for the Red Bull junior team, a life-defining moment: "It can make you or break you," Ricciardo admits.

According to Margeit, it was the making of Ricciardo. "As a driver, he's obviously matured massively," he reflects.

"Until he hooked up with the Red Bull junior team at the start of 2008, he was never really in the best car or team. I've seen a lot of young kids over the years, and an awful lot of them are happy playing at being a racing driver without really putting the effort in. Not Daniel. He worked hard at it. It wasn't just a game, it was his future. When he did the test, basically an audition, for Red Bull at the end of 2007, he just brained them, a second-and-a-half quicker than the next fastest guy, from memory. They snapped him up."

With Red Bull's support, Ricciardo quickly progressed through the development categories. In 2012 he was placed with the Toro Rosso F1 team, which serves as a finishing school for the best junior-program graduates.

Two years with Toro Rosso were enough to convince Marko and the rest of the team management that Ricciardo was ready to step up to formula one.

While Ricciardo admits he isn't close to Vettel, he insists there is mutual respect - the two young drivers have even been spotted eating breakfast together, something Vettel would never have done with Webber.

"He [Webber] came in from another team, so he wasn't a protégé from a young age like myself and Seb, so I guess the relationship there was already a bit different between him and Helmut and myself and Helmut."

Ricciardo admits that the pressure from Red Bull to succeed can be intense. "The first few years I was in the program, every time I saw Marko's number on my phone a good day could turn into a bad day very quickly," he reflects. "But things have got better now, so we're all good. It's nice that the success I have is also passed on to him as well."

Along the way, Ricciardo has become a household name in Australia, replacing Webber as our high-speed hero. Webber toiled for years to get his big break and then had to fight his corner against the Marko-Vettel axis, and it showed.

In his final few seasons, especially, Webber came across as a tired, world-weary veteran of the sport. Ricciardo, by contrast, flashes his cheesy smile - and the world's F1 fans love it. Don't be fooled, though: once the helmet goes on, he's ruthless.

"I'm very competitive. If I have to 'turn it on', I know how to. The switch isn't hard to find, don't worry."

A formula one world driver's championship is something that eluded Webber during his career, but it's definitely in Ricciardo's sights.

"To win a world championship, a lot has to happen," he acknowledges. "We saw Mark get very, very close. It's not easy. It's a long season and all the rest of it. Personally, I'd love to say when, not if, because I believe I can. I believe it's going to happen, but we'll have to see ...

"I don't want to put all that pressure and expectations on myself and then not get it done. Let's say if the opportunity's there to be taken, I'll take it. Hopefully sooner rather than later. I don't want to race around here with grey hairs."

The writer travelled to Austria with the support of Renault Australia.

smh.com.au