Did Daniel Ricciardo still possess the speed of old? Yes is the answer from Racing Bulls, but they failed in allowing him to show that consistently.

That is the admission made by Racing Bulls team principal Laurent Mekies, after Red Bull made the call to axe Ricciardo from their B-team during the 2024 campaign.

Racing Bulls accept blame for Daniel Ricciardo woes

After a disastrous stint with McLaren, Ricciardo returned to the Red Bull fold and made his comeback to the grid with their junior team in 2023, with the ultimate goal of working his way back into the Red Bull Racing line-up.

But, the eight-time grand prix winner was unable to impress to the point of forcing that breakthrough, and was dismissed from the B-team following the Singapore Grand Prix.

However, his former team is taking the blame.

“The question we have been asked the most was: ‘Can Daniel still produce the ultimate speed we have seen?’ I think he has on a few occasions, in Miami, in Canada and in quite a few other races,” Mekies told Autosport.

“So, he did produce that ultimate speed that took him to race wins in the past.

“But for the team, as for the drivers, the biggest difficulty is not to be fast one day. It’s to be fast in every race. Did we manage to keep Daniel in that sweet spot often enough? No, that’s the reality. I raised my hand and we raised our hands as a team, because we have a big part to play in it. And this led to what happened.”

However, even if the overall on-track performance was not as spectacular as team and driver had hoped for, Mekies explained how Ricciardo played a crucial role behind the scenes.

“There was a huge benefit for the team and for Yuki [Tsunoda] in terms of Daniel’s technical feedback, direction of development, race-winning approach,” Mekies revealed.

“Having somebody that knows how it is in a team that wins races, that fights for championships, is setting the benchmark and that counts a lot in a time where you are trying to build the team and target better results.

“That benefit has been huge, also in terms of car understanding and car development. And I think Yuki has been developing a good relationship with Daniel to the extent that he has been able to absorb quite a lot of that and to keep progressing himself in that area.”

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And Tsunoda now becomes the team leader at Racing Bulls with Ricciardo’s replacement Liam Lawson moving up to Red Bull for F1 2025 after Sergio Perez’s departure, while 2024 F2 Championship runner-up Isack Hadjar comes in at Racing Bulls.

For Lawson, as a Red Bull driver, he will be expected to play the supporting role for Max Verstappen who will chase a fifth straight World Championship in F1 2025.

Asked if Lawson has been signed to “complement” Verstappen, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner told talkSPORT: “Absolutely.

“If you liken it to football, you can’t have two [elite] centre forwards – you’ve got to have strength and depth in your team.

“I think that Liam, with the experience that he has coming into the team, is there to provide that strength in depth in what we need from an engineering perspective, from a tactical perspective, because it’s going to be tight next year.

“You’ve got Ferrari that’ll have [Lewis] Hamilton and [Charles] Leclerc two very strong drivers; you’ve got [Lando] Norris and Oscar Piastri at McLaren.

“There’s contradicting aspects [within F1] because, on the one hand, you’ve got the team and the drivers are contractors to the team.

“On the other side, you’ve got the Drivers’ Championship where the interest and the individual interest is. It’s about communication and being up front with the drivers.

“We’re perhaps slightly different to other teams where we go: ‘Do you know what? Max Verstappen is the most valuable asset in Formula 1. He’s our lead driver. If you can get close to him, fantastic. But the reality is the expectation is for Max to win.’

“A team like Ferrari next year, for example, are going to have two drivers that are going to be taking points off each other – and which horse do you back?

“You have to back both of them, but that sometimes becomes divisive within a team.

“Different teams have different approaches.”

Verstappen is under Red Bull contract until the end of 2028, having signed the longest contract anywhere on the F1 grid.

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