When asked what “F1 p***” is like, the McLaren driver remained tight-lipped and joked: “Wait, I think my phone’s ringing, I’m just going to take this call.” He added: “I’m not even going to talk, that’s hilarious,” as he rubbed his brow while he continued to giggle away with comedian Tom Segura, who asked the bizarre question.
The 33-year-old produced one of his best results of the season this past weekend, as he finished seventh at the Mexico Grand Prix this past weekend. Gaining ground on Yuki Tsunoda on Lap 51 of 71, Ricciardo tried to make a move for P11 down the inside of Turn 6 but the McLaren driver ended up hitting the right-hand sidepod of the AlphaTauri, sending it airborne and into the run-off.
While Ricciardo continued on, Tsunoda brought his car back into the pits and retired from the race, with the Australian receiving a 10-second penalty for the collision – albeit a late charge on the soft tyres earning him P7. After the race, Ricciardo said: “I just saw the replay and it wasn’t blatant. I’ve gone in, locked [up] and crashed into him. I feel like I held a pretty tight line.
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“It was maybe a little bit me, there’s a lot of blind spots, but all we needed was to give each other 30 more centimetres and then we were good. The truth is, I wasn’t actually trying to lunge him in the corners, I was just trying to stay there, hold him a little bit wide then get the exit with the fresher tyre.
“But anyway, look, a 10 seconds penalty was more than enough to justify that, and I came back through. I actually didn’t respond to Tom [Stallard, race engineer] when he said you’ve got [a] 10 seconds [penalty].
“I was like, ‘The one race where we’ve got pace!’ “So anyway, I got my head back down and we eventually pulled a big enough gap on the others so [I’m] happy.” With the Australian now having just two races left with McLaren after he and the team agreed to cancel his contract a year before it was set to expire, the F1 star appeared to have mixed feelings about his performance on Sunday despite the positive result.
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“It’s so nice,” he said of the performance. “I wish there was an explanation why it hasn’t been like this more often, races where I can just lean on the car and kind of put it where I want.
“Obviously there’s only a few left, better late than never, happy to have had an attacking race. I feel normally if we’re in the points, we’re looking in the mirrors, so to come through the field felt good and yeah, the team I’m sure feel happy as well, and relieved after the penalty.”
Ricciardo will hope to finish his final season with McLaren on a high in Brazil and Abu Dhabi later this month – the final two races of the season.
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