Daniel Ricciardo’s Former Confidante Turned Competitor Reveals His Bizarre Desire To Eat 119 lbs. Yuki Tsunoda

When Daniel Ricciardo was sacked from McLaren at the end of 2022, his trainer and friend Michael Italiano started working with AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda. Now, with Ricciardo joining the Red Bull’s sister team, he will be closer to Italiano again. However, he will be training his direct rival, Tsunoda. Under bizarre circumstances, Italiano recently revealed that given the chance, he would love to “eat” Tsunoda, who weighs 119 lbs.

Italiano and Ricciardo have been friends with each other since the latter was 12 years old. Ricciardo had his childhood friend with him as a personal trainer during his Red Bull, Renault, and McLaren stints. However, when Ricciardo was left without an F1 seat at the end of 2022, Italiano parted ways and joined AlphaTauri, where he has been associated with Tsunoda ever since.

In only their first year together, Italiano and Tsunoda have developed a very friendly relationship. So much so, that in a recent podcast, Italiano jokingly mentioned that he would love to eat Tsunoda up. The Australian trainer also gave a very bizarre reason to support his comments.

Yuki Tsunoda and his “tender muscle tissues”

Italiano recently appeared on the Dirty Air F1 podcast where he was answering funny questions asked by the hosts. He was given a hypothetical situation, where he was stuck on a desert island with all the F1 drivers. The hosts then asked him which driver he would eat first in order to survive.

Italiano took absolutely no time and replied that it would be Yuki Tsunoda. He explained: “It kind of doesn’t make sense. because he is the smallest. You’re getting the least amount of food. But the amount of high-quality Japanese that guy eats. I feel like the tenderness of his muscle tissue would be beautiful.”

There was a slight pause and everyone broke into laughter after this weird explanation. Italiano understood that his comment went viral, and replied under the podcast’s Instagram page, to admit that he could get fired for this.

Yuki Tsunoda’s obsession with food

F1 drivers have to be in top shape all the time to cope up with the extreme physical strain they go through when driving a car. Tsunoda faces an issue with this, because of his love and obsession for good.

In an interview with Sports Illustrated, Italiano had revealed just how much Tsunoda loves to eat. When asked if the AlphaTauri racer is actually obsessed with food, Italiano said, “Oh, yeah, times 10. Always.”

He went on to narrate how both of them were in London for a day and Tsunoda drove him to a Japanese restaurant to have a grand feast. Therefore, it is quite evident how big a foodie the AlphaTauri star is.