F1 supporters have been buzzing ever since fan favorite Daniel Ricciardo made his return at this weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix. And as the Australian takes part in his first race weekend this year, his former boss, Zak Brown, was asked if his McLaren team yet owed the 34-year-old something after terminating his contract prematurely. The 51-year-old was interestingly asked about the same after having already paid Ricciardo a whopping $18,000,000 for terminating his contract a year early.
The Honey Badger’s stint with McLaren ended early following his disappointing performances with the team over two seasons. This is because in both the 2021 and the 2022 seasons, Ricciardo underperformed inexperienced teammate Lando Norris.
After 243 days away, the Honey Badger returns to the track #HungarianGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/zxkC6XC6no
— Formula 1 (@F1) July 21, 2023
In 2021, Norris beat Ricciardo by 35 points and in 2022 this gap increasing to a staggering 85 points. As a result of his underperformances, Ricciardo revealed how it took a toll on his mental health. However, there is a possibility that his massive paycheck from McLaren during this tough time would have at least provided him some comfort.
Zak Brown reveals he is happy to see Daniel Ricciardo back
During this weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix, Martin Brundle asked Zak Brown if McLaren were still paying Daniel Ricciardo despite him having left the team last season. Brown laughed while replying and said (as quoted by irish.mirror.ie), “All of our financial arrangements have come to an end“.
He then added that the Australian is a free man now and that his team were happy to see him return to the grid. After stating the same, Brown concluded his remarks by stating that he hopes to see Ricciardo achieve success even though he is no longer driving for McLaren.
As for Ricciardo, he will hope to hit the ground running as soon as possible with AlphaTauri as he will know better than anyone that he cannot take this opportunity for granted. And it seems that the 34-year-old has taken some learnings from his time at McLaren which he believes he can utilize at AlphaTauri.
Ricciardo explains the “trap” he fell into at McLaren
Since AlphaTauri is the slowest car on the grid, many fear that Daniel Ricciardo may not enjoy his time at this team. However, the Australian believes that he will utilize his disappointing time at McLaren and create his own destiny with the Italian outfit despite their recent struggles.
As quoted by racer.com, Ricciardo said in a recent interview after AlphaTauri announced him, “I started probably just falling into a little bit of a trap where I was like, ‘Yeah, this car doesn’t suit me. And I need to work around this and this and this‘”.
Because of his learnings at McLaren, the 34-year-old then concluded his remarks by stating that he understands that the AlphaTauri car will have its limitations, and that he is willing to “work with that“. Hence, it will now be interesting to see if Ricciardo can put on a strong enough performance for the rest of this season at AlphaTauri to make a case for himself for the second seat at Red Bull.
