Daniel Ricciardo’s F1 exit: Inside 2am meeting and call taken out of Red Bull’s hands
RB CEO Peter Mayer has lifted the lid on Daniel Ricciardo’s abrupt exit, with the 35-year-old replaced during the ongoing season by reserve driver Liam Lawson.
There had been plenty of speculation over Ricciardo’s future ahead of the Singapore Grand Prix and his axing was confirmed after the race, with fans critical of the way Red Bull handled the situation.
Visa Cash App RB (VCARB) team principal Laurent Mekies even dmitted they should have handled things differently, stating at the United States Grand Prix : “We are not happy with ultimately how we handled it, and of course we are very conscious that we could, and we should, have done a better job at that.
Now, Daniel and us, we were talking on a very regular basis, and then we went into that weekend knowing both of us what the situation was. For a number of reasons we decided to go into [Singapore] trying to keep it [not] public and it proved very, very quickly in the weekend that unfortunately it was not the right decision.
“Certainly we would do things differently if we had to do it again. Now, I’d like to think that from what we saw in Singapore, from the reaction of the fans, from the reaction of the paddock, it was unbelievable how in one way or another, all these streams of love, all these streams of support did arrive nonetheless, even if it was not official, even if it was not the most classic send-off.”
However, Bayer has now insisted the team had made an agreement with Ricciardo not to announce his departure ahead of the race. “We had agreed with Daniel that we would not communicate it,” Bayer told Auto Motor und Sport.
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