How “more balanced” Ricciardo has learned to manage his F1 travails

It’s classic Daniel Ricciardo. As we take our seats at the table on the first floor of McLaren’s hospitality unit, he flashes a wide grin and extends his hand, inviting GP Racing to a lively handshake. He’s at the end of a marathon of sorts, having had several consecutive interviews crammed into his schedule after the FIA press conference, but he’s still chipper and ready to answer questions – even though most of them won’t be of the pleasant variety. He’s used to it, after all. It’s become his routine – pretty much from the start of his McLaren tenure.

It’s the Thursday ahead of the Hungarian Grand Prix, and only a few in the paddock have even the faintest idea of how crazy the next week will be. Ricciardo knew he was facing a fight to retain his seat at McLaren – he’s about to learn that fight will be to retain a role in Formula 1, with news of his departure coming on the eve of the Belgian Grand Prix on Wednesday.

For now all he knows is that his old team-mate, social media-phobe Sebastian Vettel, has started an Instagram account seemingly with the sole purpose of informing the world of his impending retirement. It’s an announcement which has caught many people off guard, as will the manoeuvrings of the days to come…

 Back to basics

Daniel knows his stock has been in decline this season but he holds on to the knowledge that he’s dug his way out of tight spots in the past. This is far from the first time he’s gone into the August break in bad spirits.

Last year, having just finished 11th in Hungary, Ricciardo spent nearly a minute in the cockpit of his stopped McLaren before climbing out. He had 50 points to his team-mate’s 113. After effectively ending Nico Hülkenberg’s F1 career and stripping Esteban Ocon of his status as one of F1’s hottest young properties, at McLaren Ricciardo has encountered a young, ambitious but also sufficiently experienced and team-integrated Lando Norris. Who, as it turns out, is also scary-fast.

Daniel struggled to adapt to the McLaren MCL35M, which proved a different beast to the Renaults and Red Bulls he’d dealt with before – and, during their first half-year together, McLaren bosses never saw
 the Ricciardo they’d recruited.

The break in the summer of 2021 was timely.

Ricciardo spent nearly a minute in the cockpit of his stopped McLaren before climbing out having finished 11th in Hungary last year

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images

“Well, last year, it was all pretty overwhelming,” recalls Daniel.“The struggle I was going through was unexpected. I was thinking I’d do a lot better than I was doing. And we were just so much in it, trying to figure it out, but we weren’t really getting anywhere. So, it was just like... ‘I just want to get away. Just give me a few weeks to have a think, reset, just clear my head.’

“Because, like a lot of sports, so much is mental, you know, so all of us on our day can be amazing and can drive fast and whatever. But yeah, there was just a lot of noise in the head and stuff, and I think as well we were just working so hard, trying to understand it, that we also needed to switch off, step back.

“I had a nice break. And then I came back and just felt like, okay, let’s refresh. I was also, you know, not really expecting anything. Just go drive, have fun, don’t think, ‘Am I gonna be P15 again?’ Just don’t think about the result, really, go drive and just push the car and don’t give a shit.

“Because you can overthink it. Especially when there’s so much data, there’s so many engineers and so many things happen so fast, you are processing information so quickly in this sport, that it’s already a lot. And then if you have a lot more chatter and ‘do this, try that’, you can just become exhausted. So sometimes you have to break it down... literally go to basics.

“Just drive the way you think is right and then see what happens.”

Smelling blood in the Monza water

It was at Monza where Ricciardo not only rescued his season but also bought himself time to figure things out. Last year’s McLaren had its quirks, but it was a weapon on high-speed tracks. Daniel still lost to Norris in qualifying, but only by 0.006s – and with it being a sprint, he had the opportunities afforded by at least two starts. And if there was one thing he could do well with the MCL35M, it was getting the car off the line.

"The struggle I was going through was unexpected. I was thinking I’d do a lot better than I was doing" Daniel Ricciardo

“I definitely felt better after the break,” he says. “And I was still holding a bit of anger, that I know I can do better. I know it. I see others do podiums, and this and that. And I was just, really, ‘I know I can do it’.

McLaren cheered Ricciardo over the line as he took the team's first win since 2012

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images

“[At] Monza we put the car on track and it was competitive. And I was just like, ‘Right, this is a weekend where I don’t want to leave the track frustrated again, angry. None of this shit. I just want to get everything out of it.’

“I had a little bit of a chip on my shoulder. I was a bit angry, but in a good way. And then I got outqualified by Lando and Max [Verstappen] by something really small, and while that made me even more angry, that was good. Because then I knew we had the sprint and then the main race. My stats were really good last year, so I had a lot of confidence in that. And I was like, ‘OK, I’m moving forward every start.’”

Ricciardo made up two places on Saturday, and picked up a front-row spot thanks to Valtteri Bottas’s penalty. Another clean getaway on Sunday meant he was leading Max Verstappen out of the first chicane.

“I personally think it’s a sign of a true competitor – you know if you smell the blood, you just can’t let it go,” he says.

“You’re attracted to it, you know you want it. I mean, Monza, it was an opportunity which I knew was there. And it was the opportunity that I’d been wanting all year or three years. Even [sitting] on the front row, I knew a lot of people were saying, ‘Can you get a podium?’ Deep down I was thinking, ‘Ah, I think I could do more.”

Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton colliding helped, but even by that point Ricciardo had already been in control.

“On paper actually it looked quite boring, because I led into Turn 1 and I led the whole race,” he smiles. “But yeah, I was so happy being in the lead and being in control. And it felt so good. Where normally, if you’re winning, whether it’s... anything in sport, a lot of the time you’re thinking, ‘Alright, let’s finish the game now, [give me] the trophy,’ you know, you start to get nervous in front. Or if you’re supporting a football team, andit’s 2:0... just blow the whistle already!

“For me, when I was in the lead, I was thinking, ‘No no no, I want to enjoy this feeling. I want every lap to go. And I don’t want to just see the chequered flag.’ I was the target, and I enjoyed being a target. I wanted to enjoy that moment, the moment I’d wanted for so long.”

Ricciardo's Monza victory bought himself time to figure things out in the MCL35M

Photo by: Motorsport Images

The car still has its quirks

What a difference a year makes. The Monza win was a bright spot, but only a spot. Ricciardo would score in just three of the eight races after that.

And a technical rules reset for 2022 hasn’t helped either McLaren or Daniel himself. The team hasn’t managed to break out of the midfield, and the driver found the MCL36 has inherited some of the tricky characteristics of its predecessor.

"I would say some of the things from last year which I struggled with, they are still in this car" Daniel Ricciardo

“To be honest, the car is still... The regulations make the car feel different, but like the DNA of the car is still very similar,” Ricciardo says. “I would say some of the things from last year which I struggled with, they are still in this car.

“It’s something I think we’re starting to understand better. Because obviously I tried to describe it, but to really understand – is it aero, is it [suspension] geometry – you know what I mean?

“So, I think we’re starting to understand better what it is, and Lando also complains about it. I think he’s just used to it. But I think he also knows that something is giving me this feeling. And it’s one that, I mean, some days when it’s eight-tenths off... I don’t believe this can be possible, you know?

“Because if you look across the grid, even the best driver on the grid, whoever you say it is, they are not eight-tenths better than the second-best. This is a big gap. So, there is still a lot I’m trying to learn with the car and understand, not always that easy to figure it out, but I feel we’re getting closer.”

You only need to look at the points table to understand why McLaren started looking for a replacement. Points don’t always reflect the real state of play, but even Daniel himself won’t argue – on a good day he’s close to and sometimes even level with Norris, but the bad days are the ones forming the impression.

Ricciardo found the MCL36 has inherited some of the tricky characteristics of its predecessor

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

“It’s similar, from a results [point of view] and on-track stuff,” he concedes, comparing the first half of this season with the previous one. “I’m still not fully in charge of the car.

“I still think it’s something relatively small. But then again, sometimes on the stopwatch it’s very big. So I’m like, ‘OK, maybe it’s a little bit more than something small.’

“I don’t know, I say it’s like dancing with a partner. If you are out of sync, you can’t dance. So, if I feel a little bit out of sync with the car, then I don’t feel I can do everything I want to do. And it’s not an excuse, but it’s the feeling I’m trying to chase. And that is something I’m still looking to find.

“But my mentality is better, where I think because I experienced last year I’m a little more balanced this year, and for sure I’m still angry, frustrated, but I’m controlling these emotions better to a point where I don’t let myself go too low. Because it wasn’t productive last year, I think. It’s OK to be angry and show emotion. But don’t let it carry on for 48, 72 hours, you know, let it be there for two, three hours, and then you have to move on. So this I’ve managed better. Unfortunately through experience.”

 Holding himself accountable

Daniel is a unique character, and one whose struggles it’s difficult not to have sympathy for – but F1 is a performance-driven world. Earlier this year McLaren CEO Zak Brown spoke of “mechanisms” to end Ricciardo’s deal before its term was up. While these might have been blown out of proportion at the time because other news was thin on the ground, the message was clear: McLaren wasn’t prepared to wait long to see Ricciardo deliver. His time has now proved to be up, with Oscar Piastri set to replace him should his contractual wrangling with Alpine be solved.

In all fairness, his start to 2022 wasn’t all that bad, especially in terms of speed. In Bahrain the car wasn’t competitive, in Jeddah he was on his way to points before an engine failure, and in Australia he was right behind Norris in sixth. It was Norris’s Imola podium that made for most of the gap between them, and Daniel was close to Lando before his early collision with Carlos Sainz. An engine failure and a minor early race gaffe on a damp track can be decent excuses, but Ricciardo didn’t make use of them in response to Zak’s comments.

“Sometimes I should probably be more, like, ‘Ah, yeah, we didn’t [score], because we had a problem with the car,’” he says. “I don’t know... This sport is so complex, that I think if you dig deep enough, you’ll probably always find an excuse.

Ricciardo was on his way to points in Jeddah before an engine failure scuppered his chances

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

“But I know there are a lot of people, especially in the factory, watching. So I think people will start to lose faith in you, if you’re always just saying this.

“I expect a lot from myself. So even if something isn’t perfect, I still feel I should be able to overcome it. So OK, yeah, the car wasn’t perfect, but I should have found a way to be better.

“I want to stay hard on myself, so that I keep myself accountable. Because I think the truth is, if I truly am great, and if I truly am special, I should be able to find a way to overcome the little things. So I think because I have that belief in myself, if it’s obvious [there’s a problem with the car] I’ll point the finger. But otherwise, I just want to move on.

“For sure the results say something, but it’s not the full picture. Even me, sometimes I look at just the result and I think, ‘Ah, that’s not good,’ but I will sometimes forget why. And actually after I dissect it then I think OK, it’s not perfect, but actually we did OK considering.

“But, yeah, comments like whatever with Zak or the media, I don’t really... it is what it is. I know the sport is gonna have this speculation. There’s 20 of us in the world that do it, and it’s part of it. And even if it’s blown out of proportion... it is what it is.”

It’s way too simple to say that Dan just needs to recharge, “go back to basics” and “just drive”

The legacy question

Perhaps excuses just don’t fit someone who was brought in as team leader – someone whose [supposed] eight-digit salary isn’t in the budget for him to “sometimes be close to his team-mate”.

There’s something fundamentally wrong between Ricciardo and McLaren. It’s way too simple to say that Dan just needs to recharge, “go back to basics” and “just drive”. Especially as the circumstances are making it much harder this time around.

Ricciardo was brought in as team leader but has struggled to match team-mate Lando Norris

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

“I still believe I can do it,” he says, as our interview time in Hungary approaches its conclusion. “That’s one thing. And then, I still love competition. I love going wheel-to-wheel but, yeah, simply I still believe I can win and I want those highs. I like when the lights go out, that feeling, the adrenaline, the rush.

“Obviously, the last 18 months proves that I’m not perfect. But I still see weaknesses in others as well. I don’t think anyone is out of reach. On my day I can still beat anyone on the track. So all these things keep me motivated and give me that fire.”

How will he react now, knowing that his team has finally lost faith in him? Can there be a reset? Has he still got it?

There are more questions about Ricciardo’s future than answers.

Is he still the same Daniel Ricciardo who defeated Sebastian Vettel in their only season together at Red Bull? Is he still the driver whose defection to Renault was one of the biggest transfer shocks in many years in F1?

Can he still ensure that’s what he’ll be remembered for, rather than as someone who got comprehensively beaten by Lando Norris and then became collateral damage in one of F1’s silliest silly seasons? Can he still leave this sport on a high?

The power to answer some, if not all, of these questions resides within Daniel himself.

What will be Ricciardo's next step in F1?

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images