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Daniel Ricciardo’s place in Formula 1 is at risk as Red Bull will decide its 2025 driver line-ups after this weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix, and is expected to promote Liam Lawson to its second team next season.
Red Bull is approaching a contractual deadline to give its young driver Lawson a race seat in one of its teams for next year or he's free to leave Red Bull, which Ricciardo alluded to in Singapore on Thursday.
Ricciardo admitted he does not know if he will be on the grid in 2025 but will “definitely know” before the next race in the United States in late October, which follows an unusual four-week break in the calendar.
There has been speculation in German media that Ricciardo could even be dropped for the rest of the season. It is thought that Helmut Marko, who is a big supporter of Lawson, wants to make the change quickly whereas Red Bull’s current intention is just to decide on the line-up for 2025.
“My first expectation is [it will be] about next year,” Ricciardo said when asked by The Race to clarify what decision will be made after this weekend.
“That’s where I'm at at the moment. I can't give too many details, but in terms of contract, our dates pretty much come into this window now.
“Basically, I do expect a yes or a no for 25. And then I'm aware of some talk and speculation about the rest of the season, but that, at the moment, I'm unaware of.
“The decision I expect is for next year. But obviously, crazy things have happened in this sport, so I'm also not gonna stand here too confident that, ‘oh yeah yeah yeah’.
“I believe I will be [on the grid] but let’s see.”
Ricciardo’s position has been in a state of uncertainty almost the entire season because Red Bull’s intentions for its drivers have fluctuated through the year in what has been an unusually volatile situation.
At times, Red Bull’s preferences have changed race-to-race. The Race understands that while Lawson is expected to be put alongside Tsunoda next year the decision is not yet final.
Ricciardo said that he doesn’t know if the minds of the management – Marko and Red Bull Racing CEO and team principal Christian Horner – are already made up or can be swayed by what happens on-track in Singapore.
“What's crazy about the sport is,” Ricciardo said, “and this is me just kind of talking a bit of s**t, but I go and get a podium this weekend and then I'm probably the hottest thing in the sport!
“That's the kind of the merry-go-round we're on. And I know it can change so quickly.
“I'm aware that things are hotting up, so to speak, but I just have to try and get my head down this weekend, and kick some arse.”
'I WISH I'D FOUND MORE CONSISTENCY'
Red Bull seriously evaluated dropping Sergio Perez from the main Red Bull Racing team in the summer break due to his poor form but opted to redouble its efforts to support him, and felt Ricciardo had not made a completely convincing case to replace him anyway.
Ricciardo had been in stronger form before the break after recovering from a difficult start to the year, although in the three races since the season resumed his performances have been mixed, and he trails Tsunoda 12-5 in qualifying.
He and Tsunoda have tended to trade weekends in which one is faster in qualifying or finishes ahead but both have been hamstrung by the RB team running into development setbacks and becoming less competitive in the midfield.
With Tsunoda already signed up to race for RB again next year, and Red Bull showing no sign of wanting to go back on that decision, it can only be Ricciardo who makes room for Lawson – barring a massive turnaround.
Ricciardo has consistently admitted he has not made a compelling case for himself over the whole season but has been happier with his overall performance trend since June’s Canadian Grand Prix.
“If you asked me in January, how do you think the year is going to go, I would have expected it to have gone better than this,” Ricciardo admitted.
“But it's not through a lack of anything really, I really felt like I put everything into it this year. And, OK, sometimes the result doesn't come out the way you wish or hope or doesn't always translate to maybe the effort you put in. But that's sport.
“You can always argue both ways. You're going to have fans and people that see the good, but you're going to have others that say I wasn't consistent enough, or this or that.
“I'm always going to look at myself in the mirror and try to be as critical of myself as possible. And I wish I'd found some more consistency this year."
Ricciardo, who believes this RB stint has generally been better than his ill-fated two-year spell at McLaren, also feels the midfield battle has made it difficult to stand out consistently.
“But honestly, getting back into the sport after the McLaren period, I was more just looking for speed and proving to myself that I could still run at the front with these guys. And there have been moments of that.
“Obviously, I wish I could produce it every weekend, but if I take a little bit of heat away from myself, I think it's also hard to do in a midfield battle.
“Every track kind of suits one or the other, and it's hard to shine when you're in such a tight fight. So that's why I think all of us drivers have had moments this year, but it's been hard for someone to be consistently, in the midfield battle, be ‘the guy’.”
TIME TO LOOK OUTSIDE F1?
Losing his RB seat would likely mean Ricciardo’s only real chance of staying in F1 is taking Perez’s place at Red Bull Racing.
But that is looking more secure after three increasingly encouraging weekends since a summer reset, and Red Bull’s admission that it has traced its development missteps all the way back to an upgrade that Perez first questioned back in the first half of 2023.
With Perez performing better against Max Verstappen and Red Bull seemingly finally adjusting its car to address an issue Perez has been vocal about for some time, it seems more likely that his seat will be secure for 2025 as well.
Ricciardo has not had talks with other teams, nor have they shown interest in him.
There is one other vacancy, at Audi-owned Sauber, but that team is looking at re-signing either incumbent Valtteri Bottas or replacing him with a young driver like McLaren junior Gabriel Bortoleto, Williams academy driver Franco Colapinto, or Sauber’s own protege Theo Pourchaire.
Despite that, Ricciardo says he has not given much consideration to finding a drive outside of F1, as he is not sure he wants to compete in another championship.
“I've thought about it because I also thought about it a couple of years ago when I knew that I wasn't gonna start the '23 season,” Ricciardo said.
“I'm still a competitor, I still have a lot of fire in me, but maybe that itch is scratched doing something else - I don't know.
“It’s hard, even talking about just being in F1 and fighting for maybe a 10th place every now and then, it’s maybe the same with doing another series.
“No disrespect to other series, I'm a fan of NASCAR and a lot of other forms of motorsport, but because I've been there and experienced the highest of highs, will I get true fulfilment doing something else? And no guarantee I'll be awesome doing something else.
“So is that going to actually scratch the itch and give me what I want? I don't know. I'd probably say more no than yes.
“But these are things I'll think about if I'm not in this position.”
