Much has been written of Daniel Ricciardo's return to the Formula 1 grid with AlphaTauri, replacing unexpectedly inept rookie Nyck de Vries in what is a homecoming for the much-liked Australian, who now opened up on the break he has been given, how it came about and the plan to maximise his comeback.
The official "I am happy to be racing again" PR sound bites from Red Bull, did the rounds last week, today F1 reporter Lawrence Baretto extracted more details in a sit-down interview with Ricciardo shortly after the announcement.
Some sectors of the F1 fan populace, see it as a demotion for Dan, while others Martin Brundle among them warn that 34-year-old Ricciardo must beat his 23-year-old AlphaTauri teammate Tsunoda, from day one in the same cockpit and, as they say in racing parlance he has to 'own' the Japanese driver not long after that.
If he needs a template on how to do it, he need only watch Max Verstappen in action against Sergio Perez, in the senior team where Dan might end up for all we know. Maybe sooner rather than later if a certain Mexican veteran does not start making it into Q1 again and run close to Max again.
But for now, it is AlphaTauri that his bum will sink into starting at the forthcoming Hungarian Grand Prix, and Ricciardo is grateful for that: “It’s good, it’s really good! I enjoyed this… Call it six months off. I think it was really good for me. But the more races I started to attend, the more sim I started to do, I was certainly getting the bug back, so to speak.
“Then jumping into the car a few days ago, I was like, ‘Oh yeah!’, it all felt very normal. It was one of those ones, the very first lap: Oh, this is fast! Then within a few, it’s: OK, I want to go faster now! So, it was really good," added Ricciardo after his test in the wake of the British GP at Silverstone last week.
Ricciardo: I didn’t really need to think much about it
As for how the call came from Red Bull driver boss Helmut Marko, Ricciardo recalled: "It was like: OK, let’s just hear what he has to say. I think that’s probably the best thing because sometimes you’re trying to prepare yourself: What if he asks for this? Let’s just hear him out and see what happens.
“I didn’t really need to think much about it. I think, as well, being back in this family, I feel so much… I would say there’s certainly some familiarity, but I also feel at home, I feel like I’m kind of just going through it all again.
“These were the calls I used to get and these were the moments they used to kind of throw in front of us. There was no question that I was going to say yes, it was just I guess the reality of: OK, it’s going to happen pretty soon," revealed Ricciardo
Ricciardo's tale of deserting Red Bull when his shares were sky-high is well told. Shying off from fighting RBR's chosen one Verstappen. He skipped to arch-enemy number 1, the Renault team of Cyril Abiteboul which is sure to have burnt a bridge or two.
Then the ill-fated move to McLaren followed whereupon he was roundly beaten by up-and-coming Lando Norris, so much so Zak Brown broke the bank to extract smartly extract Oscar Piastri from Alpine. And then, to add insult to injury, pay Dan to rip up his contract a year earlier so the Aussie rookie could get his chance.
The return of Red Bull's prodigal son enters an intriguing phase
It was brutal, but at Renault and McLaren Ricciardo became a very rich man, but his F1 record is starting to read like journeyman. With no team wanting his services for a full time seat, Red Bull repaired the burnt bridges and offered their prodigal son a fitting homecoming.
Dan was by far the most visible F1 reserve this season. And with two and a half of their four drivers struggling; Tsunoda is sometimes good and sometimes very bad. Perez was good but is now so bad his seat in the best car in F1 is also on the line.
De Vries, as we all know, simply did not have the speed. Only Verstappen delivered full marks every weekend. Thus it was merely a matter of time before Ricciardo got his name atop an F1 garage entrance.
Now, 11 races into the season when F1 resumes in Hungary, a ten-race break for Daniel he is back for his 233rd Grand Prix start: “Getting back to Red Bull and just kind of the reception I had walking back into that team was really kind of, in a positive way, a little bit overwhelming.
"Then getting back on the sim, I was still a bit unsure how it was going to go, if the car would feel like it used to, if I was going to be, for the lack of better words, like the old me. Once I’d done a few sim sessions and started feeling like myself again, it then just kind of brought me back to normal Daniel, where I was falling back in love and ready to go again.”
Ricciardo is fortunate. Second chances in F1 tend to be rare and the pressure will start the minute he steps into the AlphaTauri in Budapest for FP1, with nowhere to hide. He will expect and be expected to beat his teammate Tsunoda to start with.
Ricciardo has to beat Tsunoda from the moment he steps into an AlphaTauri
Expectations are well summed up by Sky F1 pundit Martin Brundle: “It’s high risk for Daniel in what is probably the slowest car on the grid. He must beat Tsunoda, he’s absolutely got to. He needs to edge him in qualy and in the races, that’s an absolute given as an expectation. Maybe he can outperform that car."
The AlphaTauri AT04 is a bad car. Or put it this way, it is not the Red Bull R19 that Dan tested the other day, that's for sure, and he knows it: “The car will be what it is. I’m going to drive it and work from there. I don’t want to get too much… Preconceived ideas.
“I appreciate the car’s going to have its limitations. I’m sure they’re probably just lacking some overall downforce and things like this, but I think if it’s a car that feels balanced – it might not have as much grip as the Red Bull I drove a few days ago – that’s something I can work with.
“I’m looking forward to also developing it and using my experience, and ultimately, I think, for Budapest, just go out and have fun, try and use more right foot than left and have a good time!
“That’s why it feels a bit like back when I was working my way up through it, in the Red Bull family,” he added. “That was it, ‘If you get results, we’ll keep pushing you, we’ll keep pushing you’. That’s really like the mindset.
“I know the team… It’s been tough to get a points finish this year, a top 10, so to push this car and try to get it inside the top 10, I think that would get everyone pretty fulfilled and excited," reckoned Ricciardo.
While it is hardly a given that this is the beginning of the return of the HoneyBadger to the Red Bull senior team, it may end up being a long lifeline for Ricciardo as the energy drinks bosses have interesting plans in the pipeline for the team that was once Minardi.
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