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niggard. joke. tattoo. The infamous and exaggerated “Pierreee Gaslyyyyyy!!!” exclaims Nico Hülkenberg.
With eight wins, three pole positions and 32 podium finishes in 13 seasons, Daniel Ricciardo is neither a world champion nor one of Formula One’s all-time greats. But in the modern era of sport, the Australian driver has worn his heart on his sleeve and cemented himself as a unique icon. The authenticity and humanity that Ricciardo has brought over the years has attracted new and old fans alike.
Ricciardo gives us a sneak peek at six seasons of Netflix’s ‘Drive to Survive’ docu-series, and it’s the same driver media we’ve seen in the paddock. But beneath the surface is a fierce competitor. His best years were at Red Bull from 2014 to 2018, and his last podium finish was in 2021 when he won the Italian Grand Prix, McLaren’s first F1 win since 2012.
“Anyone who thought I was gone never left,” he said over team radio that day. “I just moved it to the side for a moment.”
But he also had two hiatuses. One in 2022 when he left McLaren, and again in 2023 as he recovered from surgery while competing for AlphaTauri (now known as RB). Although his speed is evident, Ricciardo has lacked consistency in 2024. Questions have been raised over whether Ricciardo will be able to return to the first team. This goal never came to fruition.
“My goal this year was to go back to Red Bull and try to do a good enough job to fight for the win again,” Ricciardo said in Singapore. It was about making sure we still had the win,” Ricciardo said. “I felt inadequate, so at that point I thought, ‘Okay, what else am I fighting for here? ‘What else can give me fulfillment?’”
RB announced last week that Liam Lawson will replace Ricciardo for the remainder of the 2024 season. Ricciardo’s seemingly awkward exit sparked massive criticism from fans on social media. Considering Ricciardo’s widespread popularity and his legacy beyond just statistics and his unique legacy in the history of the sport.
Ricciardo has eight wins in 14 seasons on the grid. (Charles Court/Getty Images)
Ricciardo’s F1 career began similarly to how it ended.
The Australian joined the grid with HRT midway through the 2011 season, replacing Narain Karthikeyan. The team failed to score points in the first eight races of the year and decided to hand over the reins to a Red Bull Academy driver. During Ricciardo’s first season, he was often found near the back of the grid. However, he often finished ahead of teammate Vitantonio Liuzzi, one of Red Bull’s first F1 drivers.
Red Bull promoted Ricciardo to sister team Toro Rosso, now known as RB, the following year. The Australian scored his first goal in 2012 and continued to improve, finishing behind team-mate Jean-Eric Vergne in 2012 but ahead of him in 2013. When Mark Webber left F1 it was enough for Red Bull to call up Ricciardo to their senior team. 2013 campaign.
The Red Bull chapter (2014-2018) became Ricciardo’s glory years. The 2014 season marked the beginning of a new era of hybrid engines in F1, and he thrived over the next four seasons, showing his potential as an F1 world champion. It was easy to assume that he would be Red Bull’s second to team-mate Sebastian Vettel, who up to that point was a four-time world champion. But during the dominance of Mercedes’ duo of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, they lost to Ricciardo three times in 2014.
Montreal passed Rosberg with two laps to go for the Australian driver’s first F1 win. Other wins in 2014 came in Hungary (impressively overtaking Hamilton and Fernando Alonso) and Belgium (remember the clash between Hamilton and Rosberg?). At the end of the season he was third in the drivers’ standings, 71 points ahead of Vettel.
Despite dropping to midfield for Red Bull in 2015, Ricciardo reached the podium on several occasions. When Max Verstappen joined midway through 2016, Ricciardo’s biggest battle became his up-and-coming teammate. When the two competed wheel-to-wheel in Malaysia, Ricciardo emerged victorious. As Verstappen grew, the two fought, leading to a memorable clash at the 2018 Azerbaijan GP.
In 2019, Ricciardo left Red Bull for Renault. As Red Bull became a powerhouse, many people questioned this decision. In two years he only had a few podium finishes before moving to McLaren. However, his time at the Woking-based team ended a year before his contract expired (McLaren instead signed Oscar Piastri for 2023). Red Bull swooped in to keep Ricciardo in the sport as a “third driver”.
The victory at Monaco was the pinnacle of Ricciardo’s F1 pinnacle. (Dan Istitene/Getty Images)
“I stopped recognizing who Daniel was towards the end of my tenure at McLaren,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said on the F1 Nation podcast. “I said to him, ‘Why don’t you come join us and rediscover your passion for sports?’” Horner added that Ricciardo “picked up some really bad habits” during his time at McLaren. “And little by little, working with his old engineering team, he started to find himself again.”
Ricardo’s hunger has returned. When Nyck de Vries was left out of AlphaTauri, the Australian was selected as a replacement. Ricciardo later missed five races that season with a hand injury and Lawson stepped in as a replacement and made a big impression.
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However, with the senior team, Sergio Pérez has struggled in the second half of 2023. Ricciardo has essentially been a safety net for the Milton Keynes-based team and has publicly wanted a return to Red Bull. Ricciardo’s form has been inconsistent throughout the 2024 season. However, Pérez’s struggles have resurfaced, leaving many wondering whether a return to Red Bull ahead of the summer break is possible for the Australian.
“I wanted to see him use that as a springboard to get back to where he was and complete the story. But I couldn’t do that.” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner spoke to F1 Nation after news broke that Ricciardo was being replaced at RB. “Daniel was honest about this. And he knows in his heart that he did his best. He’s had a great career and done great things, but unfortunately the next chapter hasn’t been that great.”
Ricciardo’s prime career was characterized as the ultimate breakman. He was a courageous driver who harbored dreams of challenging for the World Championship before being eliminated for various reasons (such as Mercedes’ decade-long dominance). However, several of his wins featured passing masterclasses. For example, in China 2018, Ricciardo famously said, “Sometimes you just have to lick the stamp and send it.”
But perhaps one of the most iconic victories was in Monaco in 2018. Yes. That’s the picture. He nursed a mechanical problem for 50 laps, and even his race engineer was surprised, saying “Daniel, I don’t know how you did that,” after the Australian crossed the line.
His final race in Singapore marked the end of Ricciardo’s era, at least on the track.
Horner continued, “He’s a natural entertainer and showman. He’ll definitely be in front of the camera at some point and I’m sure there’ll be a documentary or something interesting coming out of it.”
“My name is Daniel Ricciardo and I am an auto mechanic.”
His voice is first heard in the pilot episode of ‘Drive to Survive’. He appeared for his first sit-down interview and did not disappoint, quickly cracking a joke on one of the first questions he was asked. With Mercedes and Ferrari absent for the inaugural season, Ricciardo took the spotlight and became one of the reasons modern fans have fallen in love with F1.
Ricciardo’s star turn in ‘Drive To Survive’ made him an F1 superstar overnight. (Peter Fox/Getty Images)
In a sport where players spend most of their time in cars with helmets on, Netflix has brought fans closer to the personalities of the sport than ever before. Ricciardo brought the human element from the beginning, wearing Red Bull gear during Season 1. As the seasons went on, several moments throughout his career that we mentioned became immortalized on Netflix. Monaco full belly flop. Riccardo moved to Renault. The emotions of winning the 2021 Italian GP with McLaren.
After leaving Red Bull for Renault, his performance on the track declined, but as Ricciardo’s career unfolded, his popularity plummeted. He became a superstar in a Netflix docu-series that partly contributed to F1’s popularity boom. Since Red Bull, the sport and his fandom have grown along with him, as key moves in his career have been intimately captured on camera. With his time at McLaren coming to an end in 2022, Netflix has put together a segment reflecting on his time in F1, showing various clips from over the years.
Before the montage ran in the Season 5 finale, a producer said off-camera: “This will be the last time I sit in this chair.” Riccardo answered, “Yes,” and the producer asked, “Have you ever thought about that?”
Ricardo sighed.
“I mean, the show wouldn’t be the same without me… “How do you do it?”
Daniel Ricardo. Forever our honey badger. pic.twitter.com/19Rf0P3yHs
— Netflix (@netflix) September 27, 2024
Fans’ edits began appearing on social media after the Singapore GP. A variety of platforms included posts honoring Australians and pairing them with songs such as ‘Pink Skies’ by Zach Bryan (one of Ricciardo’s favorite music artists). After news broke that Lawson was replacing him, many current and former drivers and several teams shared their thoughts on the Australian driver.
“(Daniel), it has been an honor to compete with you for many years. I will never forget the battles, the laughter, and the drinking in the shoes. “It was disgusting, but I’m glad I could be with you.” This is what Hamilton posted on Instagram. “You always leave a legacy of who you are. It’s never easy in this sport. You took it all with the biggest smile and I salute you for that. I have so much to offer you in the future and I can’t wait to see what you do next. I’m always here for you.”
But Ricciardo has become a bigger figure than the sport, and his popularity has extended beyond the confines of the F1 world. He has appeared on podcasts and talk shows, appearing on Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert’s shows. He attended the Met Gala for the first time in 2023, marking the fifth time Hamilton has attended. He created his own product line, Enchanté, and launched a wine collection. Official non-F1 sports accounts have also weighed in on the late driver drop, such as NFL Australia and New Zealand accounts for the Vegas Golden Knights and Buffalo Bills.
The start isn’t entirely surprising, but the swap before the final six races (and three sprints) raises eyebrows. Ricciardo’s performances lacked consistency and question marks began to appear over Red Bull’s idea of a comeback.
It remains to be seen what Ricciardo’s next move will be. Interestingly, although the word retirement has not been used publicly yet, the sentiment seems to be there.
With F1 behind him, Ricciardo has a variety of career options ahead of him. (Dan Istitene – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images)
“I am proud of this career. I tried to become a world champion, to be the best in something in the world,” Ricciardo said from Singapore. “I think that’s a big thing to ask of ourselves. Some achieve it, some don’t. In the end, if I fall short, I can’t be too harsh.
“I am satisfied with the effort I put in. There is no sadness, no emotion, no regrets or anything that could have been.”
It’s natural to wonder if he’ll look into other motorsports series like NASCAR or Supercars. Perhaps one day he will try his hand at broadcasting like Jenson Button, Jolyon Palmer or David Coulthard. Given the fan reaction to his departure, many will be hoping the 35-year-old stays in the F1 world. Horner does.
“We have been very clear that we want him to continue to be an ambassador for the team. Of course, no one can really know. I mean, if Liam can’t get the job done, if Checo can’t get the job done, we know what Daniel’s capable of,” Horner told F1 Nation. “But I think he knows he’s got a great career ahead of him at that age. I have so many memories.
“The most disgusting thing was drinking champagne out of sweaty boots! But he made it his own, and he got amazing people drinking champagne out of their sweaty shoes.”
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Top photo: Vince Mignot/MB Media via Getty Images; Design: Dan Goldfarb/athletic
