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<\/p>\n
There were still six races remaining in the season when Ricciardo made way for New Zealander Liam Lawson.<\/p>\n
The entire F1 world was aware that the race would be Ricciardo\u2019s last as cars zoomed around the famous Marina Bay Street Circuit.<\/p>\n
He came in 18th but pitted late in the race to change tyres and set the fastest lap on the penultimate lap.<\/p>\n
It was a sentimental moment and Ricciardo was visibly emotional post-race, spending an extended amount of time sitting in his car for the last time, soaking it in before jumping out.<\/p>\n
With eight career race wins to his name, the now 36-year-old\u2019s sacking was met with widespread anger in Australia and around the world given his popularity.<\/p>\n
Daniel Ricciardo poses for a portrait during the Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix 2024.Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n
But in a recent podcast interview, Ricciardo admitted he is now \u201cgrateful\u201d that curtains were drawn on his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cUltimately, I got let go,\u201d he told Ford CEO Jim Farley\u2019s podcast.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was the reality at the time. I think once that happened, I\u2019d been let go twice in the last two years, and it had also taken a lot out of me.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d put a lot of my soul into it. I was pretty exhausted by it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn reflection, I was grateful that they made the decision for me. I think it would have been hard to be like, \u2018I\u2019m done\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think I knew I was probably done because I knew it was harder for me to perform at the level I could. (Fernando) Alonso, these guys are in their forties in F1, competing very highly.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor whatever reason, I lost a little bit of something, and it\u2019s okay to admit it. It\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/p>\n
18th Placed Daniel Ricciardo looks on in the Paddock after the F1 Grand Prix of Singapore in 2024.Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n
The final years of Ricciardo\u2019s career were incredibly challenging.<\/p>\n
He made the surprise move to leave Red Bull for Renault in 2019.<\/p>\n
After an unsuccessful two years there, he moved to McLaren where his fortunes did not improve.<\/p>\n
He was ultimately removed for fellow Australian Oscar Piastri.<\/p>\n
In 2023, Ricciardo returned to Red Bull as reserve driver and soon after nabbed a seat with their secondary team – until it all came to an end the following year.<\/p>\n
Supercars exploring wildcard for F1 star | 02:49<\/p>\n
During the podcast interview, the West Australian was asked what advice he would give to other athletes dealing with retirement.<\/p>\n
He stressed that you need to be \u201chonest with yourself\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cRemove any fairytales. Remove your ego as much as possible,\u201d Ricciardo said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s people that love you and will still tell you that you\u2019re great and you can do it, but as much as you love them as well, you need to just close the door and make that decision on your own and be really honest with yourself.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I would have got to the end of last year, I think I would have still had a lot of these thoughts and had the conversation with myself, because I knew it was becoming harder for me, and I had to dig really deep to pull out a result that I was proud of.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou always want to believe everyone\u2019s looking out for you, and they probably still are, but they don\u2019t know what it\u2019s like to be you and in your situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cGive yourself enough alone time. You\u2019ll find the answer.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year, my retirement year, I gave myself a lot of time to just reflect on my career and to be at peace with it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Daniel Ricciardo has given an honest insight into the final days of his F1 career and how it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":581676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[1724,284945,64,63,689,284944,256855,9239,817,33380,813,816,284943,2105,284947,941,207186,677,25593,265335,13777,36622,942,2812,85,284946,284240],"class_list":["post-581675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-asia","tag-athletes-dealing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-brutal-decline","tag-brutal-end","tag-eastern-asia","tag-f1","tag-fellow-australian","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-frightening-incident","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-honest-insight","tag-japan","tag-jim-farley","tag-oceania","tag-penultimate-lap","tag-podcast-interview","tag-qualifying-session","tag-secondary-team","tag-singapore","tag-south-eastern-asia","tag-sports","tag-widespread-anger","tag-wildcard-spot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/581676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}