Daniel Ricciardo joined McLaren in 2021 after spending two underwhelming years at Renault. His joining the Woking-based outfit was seen as a great move on paper due to his previous racing achievements with Red Bull and his popularity among fans. On top of that, a partnership with Lando Norris was very exciting on paper.
Unfortunately for Ricciardo, the move did not work out. Norris comprehensively outperformed him over the course of two years, and other than his one win in Monza in 2021, Ricciardo did not have any major talking points. Midway into the 2022 season, McLaren decided to pull the plug early and sack him, despite there being a year left on his contract.
BREAKING: McLaren promote Andrea Stella to Team Principal role#F1 pic.twitter.com/TNGld4oV3c
— Formula 1 (@F1) December 13, 2022
Along with Ricciardo, McLaren had another big departure at the end of the 2022 season. Andreas Seidl, who is regarded as one of the most intelligent minds on the paddock also left them to join Sauber as CEO. Long-time team engineer Andrea Stella replaced the German.
After being appointed as team boss, Stella did not waste a lot of time in revealing just how important Ricciardo was to them.
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Daniel Ricciardo gave McLaren ‘lots’ of technical knowledge
Ricciardo’s results may have shown otherwise, but the entire outfit never doubted the fact that he was giving his best. Most people feel that the 33-year-old was just not comfortable with the car, which led to his poor performance. Stella appreciates the fact that he was so calm while they spent time working on his making his car better for him.
“Like, we appreciated it immensely that he stayed calm,” the Italian said to Motorsport. “He was collaborative, positive, and constructive, even during the struggle. Even on difficult weekends.”
McLaren Racing and Daniel Ricciardo have mutually agreed that Daniel will leave the team at the end of the 2022 season.
The team thanks Daniel for his dedication and contribution, including that memorable win in Monza. We look forward to finishing the season strongly together.
— McLaren (@McLarenF1) August 24, 2022
Stella went on to talk about how much Ricciardo helped them understand the technical aspect of things. The Perth-born driver carefully provided the engineers with driving data and was patient about the progress. He never made things difficult by demanding quicker results in the short run.
“Rather than becoming immediately difficult conversations,” he continued. “There were conversations where we could go to the bottom of what we could see in the data. What was his feeling?”
Stella insists that Ricciardo making things easy for everyone at the factory helped them learn a lot from what was a very difficult season for them.
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