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Amid conflicting narratives on whether McLaren F1 team’s decision to pre-maturely terminate their contract with Ricciardo could be vindicated, former F1 executive Mark Gallagher said in a statement that one should not be too sorry for Ricciardo, as he had made a vast amount of money despite a poor run of form. In the matter of the fact, Mclaren F1 team and Ricciardo had decided to part ways just after the Summer break in 2022, as the Formula 1 would be witnessing a season without Ricciardo on the paddock for the first time since 2011.
Can’t feel sorry for Ricciardo, he made a lot of money, says Gallagher
Meanwhile, as Ricciardo has taken the role of a reserve for Red Bull F1 team, speaking in a Flat Chat podcast, Gallagher said, “If Formula 1 loses Daniel, if he does disappear from F1, I’ve no doubt he’s going to have a big career elsewhere in motorsport.
We shouldn’t feel too sorry for him because he’s made a vast amount of money out of Formula 1. So from a purely financial perspective, he’s had a very lucrative career and that’s been terrific. He will feel that he never quite achieved his potential and that will be the one thing that probably he thinks about as he gets older.
There were probably better things he could have done from a purely performance perspective in his career”. Besides, submissively addressing that apart from a compensation from McLaren F1 team for a pre-mature termination of his contract, Ricciardo is making far more money than other reserves, Gallagher said, “It’s been a very different experience at McLaren.
I read the details of his interviews several times, because the more I read it, the more I felt, ‘wow, Daniel is quite confused. On the one hand, he wants to go back to basics, but then on the other, he talks about the danger of overthinking.
He slightly complains about the fact that he’s surrounded by engineers who just talk data and complexity and try this and try that. He clearly isn’t enjoying the complexity and yet, the sport is inherently complex.
You have to be able to deal with that, which means that as a driver, you need to be able to communicate to the team in a way that they will listen and the team has to be prepared to listen in order for the driver as a human being to get what he needs from the car.
The car ultimately has to give him confidence. It’s the difference between sitting in the car and being in the car and it feels like Daniel’s not really in the car, because he doesn’t feel at one with it”.