(Motorsport-Total.com) – Former Formula 1 driver Daniel Ricciardo spoke in a candid interview with Ford CEO Jim Farley about how he realized when the right time had come for his departure from the premier class.
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“I definitely had to try to understand a lot about the right time to retire over the last 12 months, because you usually don’t get it back once it’s over,” he explained.
Ricciardo admitted that he first thought about retiring from Formula 1 at the end of 2022, after his contract with McLaren had expired. “In 2022, I struggled a lot in my second year at McLaren. They let me go. So I started 2023 without a seat and thought: ‘Is this it? Should I just end it now?’ But I knew there was still a burning desire inside me.”
For Ricciardo, it was important to make this decision independently of external influences. “I really had to try to look in the mirror and say to myself: ‘Okay, forget what people say and what they want, what do you want?'” said the Australian.
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Asked if this was a purely personal moment, he added: “I tried to make it as personal as possible. There are always opinions, even if they are those of your parents or whoever, but ultimately I did my best to make sure that fire inside me was still there.”
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Ricciardo initially returned to Red Bull as a reserve driver. In mid-2023, he then replaced Nyck de Vries at AlphaTauri (now Racing Bulls) and was thus a regular driver in Formula 1 again.
But the restart was bumpy: after just a few races, Ricciardo broke his hand in an accident in Zandvoort. “I never had a racing injury in all those years and then I have this silly accident. I asked myself: ‘Is this a sign now? Should I just stop while I’m still halfway decent?'” he recalled. “But I thought to myself: ‘No, there’s still unfinished business’, and I fought my way through.”
Ricciardo stayed with Racing Bulls for the 2024 season, but was replaced by Liam Lawson after the Singapore Grand Prix. Although the decision came from the team, he feels no resentment today. On the contrary: he is glad that the decision was taken out of his hands.
“I lasted another year in Formula 1 and was then ultimately let go. That was the reality at that time,” Ricciardo confessed. “But I think when that happened, I realized that I had been let go twice in the last two years. It had also taken a lot out of me. I had put a lot of my soul into it and felt pretty exhausted. Looking back, I was grateful that they made the decision for me.”
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