“Whatever happens, will happen": Daniel Ricciardo brushes off questions around his future in F1

Daniel Ricciardo claims a Red Bull seat for the 2025 season is not his primary focus, but performing well in 2024 remains a priority. Speaking in the press conference ahead of the 2024 Australian GP, the 34-year-old driver refrained from making any predictions for the driver market ahead.

With a slow start to his 2024 campaign, Ricciardo has received a lot of negative scrutiny over his performance. The idea of him joining Red Bull’s sister team was to make a bid for his old seat for the 2025 season beyond. Despite clarifications about problems with his car in Saudi Arabia, there have been a lot of questions raised about his form in general. His Mexico GP 2023 performance was the highlight of his return. Given his ability to target wins and podiums, the 34-year-old's ability to replicate his past successes remains his own goal.

Asked whether the seat at Red Bull still remained a target, Ricciardo felt that having a strong season was the priority. He felt focusing on the season at hand made more sense than looking far out into the future. Acknowledging he was in a more privileged position than he was in 2023, the Aussie believes that his approach to 2024 has been a race weekend at a time.

Asked about his target for the 2025 Red Bull drive, Ricciardo replied:

“I don't buy into any of the stories, if you will. I know, obviously, what my position is in the team. I know, let's say, some potential things that could happen if I do really well. But that's all just... It's like everything you know. I think any team you're with, you know if you have a really strong season it could lead to maybe something different or increase your position where you currently are. I think it's always our objective to do the best we can. And I think whatever happens will happen or can happen.”

“But for us, my objective is to drive this car as good as I can. I think now getting back into a car I'm definitely not looking too far ahead. So am I thinking about the Red Bull seat that you speak of? No. I know if I do some really good results, maybe then that can present itself potentially. It's not something I think about because, yeah, as you said, 12 months ago, I wasn't in this position. I didn't know if I would be back in this position. So I think I just take it weekend after weekend.”

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Daniel Ricciardo suggests there will always be speculation about his future in the 2024 season

Daniel Ricciardo feels his 2024 season will be clouded with speculation about returning to Red Bull for 2025 and beyond. However, the RB driver believes that thinking about it would take the attention away from his job at hand. He felt it was imperative to help the team achieve a good result. The multiple GP winner felt that the chatter was a distraction from the focus at hand, and he chose not to delve into answering much about his future.

Speaking about the speculation surrounding his future, Ricciardo said:

“There will always be some, yeah, whatever going around. But I know my job and what I need to do. And I think the more I get… Look, it's through experience as well. But the more you get caught up in that stuff, then that starts taking focus away from my job and that’s driving as fast as possible. I know we do a lot of other things during the course of a race weekend but that's why we're here ultimately, to push the car to the limit and try to make it as good as it can be. So this weekend it's something I look forward to obviously being here racing at home, but yeah, as you said, after the first two races it hasn't been amazing. but it's not a concern I think it's two races out of 24 and there's a lot of new people in the team. So it's very early, but I do definitely want to have a strong weekend and yeah, do well.”

Earlier in the week, Ricciardo spoke to The Age newspaper, stating that racing and training remained his only focus going into the season. He claimed cutting out on other distractions and was looking forward to his home race. Speaking at the same press conference, the Australian also explained that the inconsistency between the RB cars was one of the reasons for the gap between him and teammate Yuki Tsunoda in Saudi Arabia. He claims to have gone back to some simulator work prior to the Melbourne race and reckons the issues on his car have been fixed.