Daniel Ricciardo received bad news after undergoing surgery on his broken hand.
The Australian, who hit the wall at Zandvoort on Friday when he encountered the crashed McLaren of countryman Oscar Piastri’s McLaren, was initially diagnosed with a broken metacarpal in his left hand.
He was put in a cast at a hospital close to the Dutch GP venue and then jetted off to Barcelona to be treated by well-known orthopaedic surgeon Xavier Mir - who also helped Lance Stroll through his broken bones early this year.
Initially, Red Bull’s Christian Horner said 33-year-old Ricciardo - who has been strongly linked with a return to the team next year - was hoping to return to his Alpha Tauri cockpit in Singapore.
That would have meant one more outing this weekend at Monza for his replacement Liam Lawson, who qualified dead last on Saturday but then finished the Dutch GP an admirable 13th.
Ricciardo posted on Instagram a photo of himself lying in a hospital bed with the caption: "Got my first bit of metal work so that’s pretty cool.
"Big thanks to everyone who reached out and kept my spirits up. This ain’t a setback, just all part of the comeback."
However, the news he received from Dr Mir was not promising.
"The operation went well," said Alpha Tauri CEO Peter Bayer, "even if the fracture was more complicated than we thought.
"I just spoke to his manager," Bayer told Sky Deutschland. "He will stay in Barcelona for a few days now to observe the healing process."
Red Bull’s Dr Helmut Marko added: "Unfortunately, it’s a complicated break. It’s not a straight break.
"We’ll get a confirmation from the doctor soon, but things are looking bad for the next two races."
The next race after Monza and Singapore is the Japanese GP in late September.