What McLaren discovered from Daniel Ricciardo's 2022 F1 difficulties

Despite Daniel Ricciardo's struggles to find consistency, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella claims that the Woking Formula 1 squad learned a lot from the Australian.

Daniel Ricciardo in a file photo (Image: Twitter)
By Mahaksh Chauhan | Dec 28, 2022 | 2 Min Read follow icon Follow Us

After two challenging seasons that included the high of winning the 2021 Italian GP, but that generally left both parties unhappy as he sought to adjust to the car, Ricciardo left the team at the end of this season. Stella is adamant that Ricciardo, who will be a reserve driver for Red Bull Racing again, had a favourable effect on McLaren. Stella, who served as the team’s executive director of racing during Ricciardo’s time there, stated, “One item I would highlight from a race team point of view is that he also brought us to some components of approach.” Like, we really valued the fact that he maintained his composure. He remained cooperative, upbeat, and constructive throughout the struggle and the challenging weekends.

Car problems

Stella said that as the team worked to fix Ricciardo’s vehicle issues, it gained technical knowledge. This implied that we learned technical and driving skills as a result of the challenges, he added. “Because there were talks where we could delve deeper into what we could see in the data, what was his feeling, rather than having to have unpleasant dialogues right away. “So I think that was an incredibly wonderful process, from which everyone learned as to what is the ethos, and what is the even emotional approach, if you like, to your profession and to human connections,” said the speaker.

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Experience with Norris

Ricciardo’s former coworker at Scuderia Toro Rosso, technical director James Key, concurred that the Australian contributed a breadth of experience to the squad that teammate Lando Norris lacked. “I worked with him ten years ago when he was probably at a level in his career similar to Lando’s,” said Key. He has always had strong technical ability. And I believe he provided us with the second reference point from a person who could sense an automobile and was aware of the situation. He certainly used examples from other teams, whereas Lando obviously doesn’t because he was raised by McLaren. So Daniel provided us with that point of reference as well. And he helped us win the race.