Daniel Ricciardo comments resurface after Helmut Marko’s broken handshake accusation

Daniel Ricciardo told PlanetF1.com earlier this year that he “probably” wouldn’t have chosen to leave Red Bull at the end of the F1 2018 season with the benefit of hindsight.

His comments have resurfaced after Helmut Marko accused the Australian of breaking handshake agreements with him and the late Red Bull founder Dietrich Mateschitz to sign for Renault for 2019.

Daniel Ricciardo comments to PlanetF1.com resurface after F1 exit

Ricciardo was dropped by Red Bull junior team VCARB this week, with Liam Lawson stepping up to partner Yuki Tsunoda for the final six races of the F1 2024 season.

VCARB’s driver swap was announced after an emotional weekend for Ricciardo at the Singapore Grand Prix, where the 35-year-old was treated to a guard of honour amid growing doubts over his future.

Ricciardo enjoyed the most successful spell of his F1 career with Red Bull between 2014 and 2018, when he collected all but one of his eight victories before announcing that he would join Renault for the 2019 season.

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Despite adding a further victory to his tally at the 2021 Italian Grand Prix at Monza following his Red Bull exit, Ricciardo never hit the same heights before being dropped by McLaren at the end of the 2022 season.

Ricciardo returned to a race seat with VCARB (then AlphaTauri) in mid-2023 after a brief spell back at Red Bull as the team’s reserve driver, but struggled upon his comeback, scoring points just four times in 26 starts.

Reflecting on Ricciardo’s decline this week, Marko told the Formula1.de YouTube channel that his “killer instinct” deserted him over time and described the decision to join Renault in 2019 as “the turning point” of the Perth-born star’s career.

Marko also revealed that Ricciardo reneged on two separate handshake agreements – with him and Mr Mateschitz, who died in October 2022 – to extend his Red Bull contract prior to his departure for Renault.

He said: “It was an event on the main square in Graz. Afterwards, we sat down together and actually came to an agreement. Sealed with a handshake.

“He then travelled to Salzburg and did the same there with Dietrich Mateschitz.

“But he had certain reservations about the Honda engine, which would come to us [for 2019], and apparently listened more to Renault and Cyril Abiteboul.”

Marko said that Mr Mateschitz was unimpressed by Ricciardo’s sudden change of heart having struck a gentleman’s agreement on a Red Bull contract extension, adding: “He was very keen to ensure that what you seal with a handshake is honoured.”

Ricciardo has consistently maintained that he has no regrets over his decision to leave Red Bull, commenting in a statement published after his VCARB exit was announced that he “wouldn’t change” anything from his F1 career.

In an exclusive interview with PlanetF1.com’s Thomas Maher at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix back in May, however, Ricciardo conceded that he would have “probably” come to a different decision in 2018 with hindsight.

He said: “It’s not that I look back and have regrets.

“But I just look back and I understand: ‘OK, this happened for this [reason]’ – and I chose that at the time.

“But I know why I made that decision. If I thought what I thought now, would I have made a different decision? Probably.

“It doesn’t mean I regret that decision at the time, that was just where my head was at.”

Ricciardo’s collision with team-mate Max Verstappen at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku, the fourth race of the 2018 season, is widely regarded as a key factor in his decision to leave Red Bull.

The Australian is known to have been frustrated by the Red Bull hierarchy’s refusal to pin the blame for the incident on Verstappen, despite television footage indicating that the Dutch driver had moved under braking, with both drivers held equally responsible.

Ricciardo famously made the decision to join Renault during a flight to Los Angeles during the summer break in a major coup for the French manufacturer and team boss Cyril Abiteboul.

However, Abiteboul was left angered by Ricciardo’s decision to leave Renault for McLaren after just a single season, with the move confirmed during lockdown in May 2020 – before the delayed F1 campaign had even started.

Appearing on the French-language Dans La Boîte À Gants podcast last year, Abiteboul described Ricciardo’s decision to leave as “a bit selfish.”

And he claimed that Ricciardo has “always had a timing problem” throughout his career, accusing him of having left Renault (now Alpine) and McLaren, who lead the Constructors’ standings by 41 points with six races remaining in F1 2024, too soon.

Abiteboul said: “He makes his decision [to leave Renault] in April or May; the world is at a standstill, we don’t know how we’re going to get back on track, if we’re going to get back on track.

“In fact, I think it’s a very early move, a bit selfish – because in the end, it will have given the team just one season’s chance, and so it’s true that it’s a decision that I’m taking badly. Badly.”

Asked if he took Ricciardo’s decision personally, Abiteboul added: “Of course, because I can see that it’s a personal rejection.

“I take it completely personally. I accept it. And I can see what the consequences are going to be too.

“The [2020] season didn’t turn out at all as we’d imagined, it turned out much better than we’d expected.

“But at the same time, we set out to do something else. We set off on projects, [re-signing] Fernando Alonso [as Ricciardo’s replacement].

“I’m completely switching to something else, and I don’t think we had the slightest opportunity to discuss whether [Ricciardo] regretted it, whether we regretted it. In any case, once I’m gone, I’m gone.

“I don’t think [Ricciardo] could have imagined the car making such progress and neither could we. I can also understand his strategy. McLaren sold him a bit of a bill of goods to get him, but that’s part of the game.

“Ricciardo always has a timing problem: he left us too early and he left McLaren too early.”

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