Daniel Ricciardo

1. Who is Daniel Ricciardo?

Daniel Ricciardo is an Australian Formula One driver, born on 1^er July 1989 in Perth (Australia) and currently 3rd driver for the Red Bull Racing team.

Daniel Ricciardo exiting his car for his first victory with McLaren © Florent Gooden / DPPI

2. Daniel Ricciardo’s junior career

Daniel Ricciardo won the Formula 2008 West European Cup in 2.0 and became vice-champion of the Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 the same year. Thanks to these encouraging results, he joined the Red Bull Junior Team. In 2009, he was British Formula 3 champion and became the test driver for Red Bull and Toro Rosso. The following year, he participated in the Formula Renault 3.5 Series where he became vice champion behind Russian driver Mikhail Aleshin.

Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull test driver in 2009 © Jean-Michel Le Meur / DPPI

3. Daniel Ricciardo’s Grand Prix (F1) journey

In 2011, after being runner-up in Formula Renault 3.5, Daniel Ricciardo joined the HRT Formula One Team to compete in his first GP of his career, replacing Narain Karthikeyan, on July 10, 2011 at Silverstone. During this first season, his best qualification was a twentieth place, and his best race ranking was an 18th position. In the championship, he finished in 26th place. Thanks to these encouraging results, Ricciardo joined the Toro Rosso team as a regular driver for the 2012 season.

During the 2012/2013 seasons, the Australian driver will start to finish in the points zone from the first Grand Prix with his new team (9th at the Australian GP). In total, Daniel Ricciardo will finish the 2012 season with 10 points and an 18th position. The following year, he improved these performances, finishing in 14th position with 20 points scored.

To compensate for the retirement of Mark Webber, Red Bull calls on Ricciardo to become Sebastian Vettel's new teammate. The qualifying results are encouraging and he will beat his German teammate several times. During the Canadian GP, ​​despite being placed in 6th position on the starting grid, Daniel Ricciardo won the first F1 race of his career. He will repeat this feat during the Hungarian and Belgian GPs. During the 2014 season, he was the only non-Mercedes driver to win Grands Prix. He will finish the championship in third position, with eight podiums and three GP victories.

For his second season with Red Bull, the Australian driver welcomes a new teammate. Having left for Ferrari, Sebastien Vettel is replaced by Daniil Kvyat. On the slopes, Daniel Ricciardo will experience one series of disappointments. He only reached the podium three times, and finished the championship in 8th place, behind the Russian.

In 2016, the native of Perth will raise his head, notably by achieving the first pole position of his career, in Monaco. While he started the season with Daniil Kvyat, Red Bull decided to replace him with Max Verstappen, following a collision caused by the Russian during the Russian GP which caused Ricciardo to retire. His only victory of the season came in Malaysia, finishing the race just ahead of his new teammate. At the end of the championship, Daniel Ricciardo finished on the podium, behind Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton.

The 2017 season confirms the revival of Daniel Ricciardo with Red Bull. The Australian driver will occupy the podiums nine times (his best total since the start of his career). During the Baku GP, he won the fifth race of his career, achieving a triple overtaking in one go during a straight line, and was voted the most beautiful of the year. Despite a large number of podium finishes, a series of three retirements at the end of the championship will weigh down his position in the final ranking. He will finish fifth with 200 points on the clock.

Daniel Ricciardo during his last Grand Prix at Red Bull © Florent Gooden / DPPI

Ricciardo's final season with Red Bull began with a fourth place at the Australian GP. A few weeks later, he scored his sixth victory in Formula 1 at the Chinese GP. His second victory of the season will come in Monaco. During the summer break, after agitating the transfer market, Daniel Ricciardo transferred to the Renault team for the 2019 season. When the championship resumes, he will not be able to get back on a podium. For his last season with Red Bull, he finished in sixth place in the standings with 170 points scored.

The Australian's first season with the French team is mixed. He was forced to retire several times (Australian GP, ​​Bahrain, Baku, Russia) for various engine problems. His best result of the season was a fourth place, achieved in Italy. In the final ranking, he finished in 9th place with 54 points scored.

For his second and final year at Renault, Daniel Ricciardo will succeed in securing two podiums with his car, during the Eifel and Emilia-Romagna GPs. In May 2020, he announced his departure and signed a contract with McLaren to replace Carlos Sainz Jr, who had left for Ferrari. He finished in fifth place in the drivers' standings with 119 points scored.

Highly anticipated at McLaren, which is looking for the perfect duo to restart the machine, Daniel Ricciardo is not having the best start to the season of his career. Associated with Lando Norris for his first with the Woking team, the former Red Bull driver is often beaten by the Briton in qualifying as well as in the Grand Prix.

In the tough from the first Grands Prix, Daniel Ricciardo was quickly dropped in the general classification and clearly saw his teammate gaining the upper hand over him. While Lando Norris was in charge of the McLaren team, the 32-year-old driver suffered the blow and did not seem able to reverse the trend. If his teammate signs three podiums (Imola, Monaco and Austria) and 5 other Top 5 during the first 9 Meetings, the new arrival at McLaren must wait for Great Britain and the 10th Grand Prix of the year to invite himself finally in the 5 best drivers in a race.

Always ahead of his teammate, Daniel Ricciardo finally sees luck smile on him during the Italian Grand Prix. On the podium of Saturday's Sprint Race and very fast on the Monza tarmac, the McLaren driver, helped by the poor pit stops of Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton but also by their collision, carried out the perfect operation to sign his first victory in orange, also his first since the Monaco Grand Prix in 2018 where he still wore the colors of Red Bull.

Refreshed after this Grand Prix victory, Daniel Ricciardo didn't benefit that much in the end. His second part of the season is still just as difficult and despite his 2th success in Formula 8, the 1-year-old driver is not taking off. Fourth in Russia two weeks after his victorious outing in Italy, he only saw points twice in 32 Grands Prix, ending the season in 2th position with 7 points, 8 less than Lando Norris, 115th in the championship.

Daniel Ricciardo, Lando Norris and Ross Brown on the Monza podium with McLaren © Florent Gooden / DPPI

While much more is expected from the eight-time GP winner during the 2022 season, the Australian will never manage to find the key. To make matters worse: the new MCL36 is not as frisky as its predecessors and the Woking team is plunging into the hierarchy behind Alpine.

While Ricciardo is under contract with McLaren until 2023, the British team decides to stop the costs and the two parties reach an amicable agreement to end their association at the end of 2022. Replaced by his compatriot Oscar Piastri, Ricciardo finds refuge with Red Bull Racing, the team which revealed him between 2014 and 2018. The Australian must however be content with a role of 3rd driver, hoping to find a starting place on the 2024 grid.

4. Auto Hebdo's opinion on Daniel Ricciardo

With his seven GP victories, Daniel Ricciardo reached the peak of his career at Red Bull. His career was also marked by numerous disappointments, notably during the Monaco GP in 2016, leading almost the entire race before being the victim of a mechanics error and finishing second. With Renault and Toro Rosso, the Australian driver alternated between good and bad. At McLaren, he will have suffered from the direct comparison with Lando Norris, even if he offered Woking its first victory in 9 years at the 2021 Italian GP, ​​his 8th personal success. This will be the only clarification in a complicated collaboration which will end in an impasse and will ultimately be shortened by one season.

Victory for Daniel Ricciardo at the 2018 Monaco Grand Prix with Red Bull © DPPI