If you have been following Formula 1 for the past year or so, you probably noticed a considerable drop in overtaking opportunities ever since high-downforce cars were introduced ahead of the 2017 season.

This year’s opener in Australia was no different, with only a handful of overtaking maneuvers occurring after the first lap. While many have claimed that it’s just the new aero that impacts trailing cars in a negative way, Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo says that the width of the cars is also to blame.

“I feel now with the wide tires and wide cars, they already take up a lot of space on the track,” he said in an interview with Autosport.

“It’s hard to find clean air. It’s getting to a point where I think some racetracks are going to be hurt by the racing. There’s not going to be much.”

“I think narrower cars were great. It’s like motorbikes, because they’re so narrow there’s always room to get past. And they lap 30 seconds slower than us. I think it proves it’s not necessarily about the lap time. We do need the raceability, because that’s the spectacle.”

The Red Bull Racing driver thinks that the best car he ever drove from a “raceability” standpoint was the 2014 version, which had less downforce than newer models. That was the year Ricciardo ended up third in the Drivers Championship standings, claiming eight podiums in total, three of which on the top spot.

Speaking of those older cars, Ricciardo had this to say: “They were slow for our standards, but for a spectator they don’t know necessarily how much different. But the racing… you could follow, you could pass. As far as overtakes went, I thought 2014 was good.”

It’s clear that the Aussie would prefer to get caught up in a more engaging type of racing, rather than just seeing which car can post the fastest overall lap time while cornering faster and faster and looking more aggressive.

“You see the side pods of the car, there’s so many bits. It looks sick, but all it means is the car behind is going to get pretty messed up.”

Even so, in the season opener two weeks ago Ricciardo finished fourth, behind Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen and ahead of McLaren’s Fernando Alonso. The next race on the calendar takes place this upcoming weekend in Bahrain.