{"id":582343,"date":"2026-04-03T06:47:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T06:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/582343\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T06:47:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T06:47:08","slug":"ricciardo-admits-he-was-grateful-team-chose-to-drop-him-in-2024-racefans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/582343\/","title":{"rendered":"Ricciardo admits he was \u201cgrateful\u201d team chose to drop him in 2024 \u2013 RaceFans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daniel Ricciardo<\/a> admitted it came as a relief to lose his Formula 1 drive in 2024 following his slump in performance.<\/p>\n

The eight-times grand prix winner made his final start at the Singapore Grand Prix in 2024 for RB (now Racing Bulls). That ended his brief comeback after McLaren cut short his contract to drive for them at the end of 2022.<\/p>\n

Ricciardo initially returned to F1 in 2023, but was soon forced back onto the sidelines due to injury. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the third race in I broke my hand,\u201d he said in a video released by Ford<\/a>. \u201cIt was such a nothing accident, but I missed however many races, I was out for 10 weeks or something.\u201d<\/p>\n

He wondered: \u201cIs this now a bit of a sign like should I just quit while I\u2019m ahead, nearly. And I was like, no, there\u2019s still unfinished business and I pushed through it.\u201d<\/p>\n

However his return the following year produced little more success. \u201cI lasted another year in F1 and then ultimately got let go,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was the reality at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

RB\u2019s decision to drop Ricciardo spared him a difficult decision, he said. \u201cOnce that happened, I\u2019d been let go twice in the last two years. It had also taken a lot out of me. I\u2019d put a lot of my soul into it and I did feel pretty exhausted by it.<\/p>\n

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cIn reflection, I was grateful that they made the decision for me, because I think it would have been hard to [say]: \u2018I\u2019m done\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Daniel<\/a>Ricciardo is an ambassador for Ford nowRicciardo felt he was no longer at his best. \u201cI think I knew I was probably done because I knew that it was harder for me to perform at the level I could.<\/p>\n

\u201cOkay, Alonso, these guys, they\u2019re in their forties in F1, [still] competing very highly. For whatever reason, I lost a little bit of something and it\u2019s okay to admit it, it\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although he continued to receive encouragement from others, Ricciardo said he knew it was time for him to stop.<\/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.\u201d<\/p>\n

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free<\/a><\/p>\n

Formula 1
\nBrowse all Formula 1 articles<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Daniel Ricciardo admitted it came as a relief to lose his Formula 1 drive in 2024 following his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":582344,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-582343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582343","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=582343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/582344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=582343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=582343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=582343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}