It’s the news no Australian Formula 1 fan wanted to hear: Daniel Ricciardo is resigned to sitting out next season’s campaign after a torrid two years at McLaren.
It’s been on the cards ever since he was dumped by Woking during the mid-season break to make way for compatriot Oscar Piastri. He may have been able to force the team to buy him out of the last year of his deal, but it came too late in the silly season for him to play a meaningful role in the driver market.
Alpine stood alone as a competitive team with an available seat, but influential elements of the French squad haven’t forgotten about Ricciardo’s sudden defection to McLaren in 2020, and they subsequently plumped for Pierre Gasly.
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With Alfa Romeo having recently re-signed Zhou Guanyu and AlphaTauri also fully subscribing itself, just two options remained at the end of last week: last-placed Williams and eighth-placed Haas.
Faced with two uncompetitive alternatives, Ricciardo has chosen the third option: sabbatical.
His logic is that a year on the sidelines might wash some of the worst episodes of his troubled McLaren tenure from F1’s collective memory and allow him to make a splash in the 2024 driver market.
He’s also frequently suggested that a year out of the sport will rejuvenate him after more than 11 years in Formula 1.
“Just having like a mental reset — I think there’s certainly some power in that,” he said at the start of the Singapore-Japan double-header, having come off the back of an unusual two-weekend break.
“After Monza … I got to get home, and it was kind of just nice being around family and switching off and spending some time at the farm and even just doing fun things — riding bikes and just being a bit of a kid again.
“That sort of stuff‘s cool, but even getting back in the paddock today, I saw Tom [Stallard], my engineer, and I felt like I hadn’t seen for a while. I kind of missed him!
“A little bit of time away is powerful. It reminds you how much you miss it.
“I feel like there could be a blessing in all that. It could like make me freaking start foaming at the mouth wanting to get back.
“I‘m also seeing positives if [I’m not on the grid].
“That‘s why I’m at peace with whatever’s going to happen in 23, because I feel like everything’s going to happen for a reason. All these things will make sense.”
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And with his reputation restored and his mind refreshed, his hope is then that the 2024 driver market is more open to him.
“I think that there could be some better opportunities then, so that‘s really what all this confirms and now where the sights are set.
“As far as my F1 career goes, the full intention is for 2024.”
But what are those options, and will his choices really be any better for sitting out of the sport for 12 months?
MERCEDES
Out of contract: Lewis Hamilton and possibly George Russell
Mercedes will be the plum seat on the 2024 driver market. It’s also tipped as Ricciardo’s most likely destination for 2023 in a reserve capacity after he admitted he considered being a test driver a “realistic” alternative to racing at the back of the grid.
A reserve role at Mercedes wouldn’t just keep him sharp ahead of a 2024 return, it would also perfectly place him to make a case to replace either Lewis Hamilton or George Russell if either stepped down.
Given Russell is the future of the Mercedes team and races on a “long-term” deal while Hamilton is in the twilight of his career, it’s the chance that the seven-time champion calls it a day that Ricciardo will be gambling on.
The only problem is that both Hamilton and team boss Toto Wolff have repetitively said that the Briton is likely to extend his stay, potentially for a long time, which would close the door on such a scheme.
It’s why a sabbatical-reserve plan can only be considered a last roll of the dice for Ricciardo. The potential pay-off is massive — a seat with the best team of the last decade — but there are far greater odds that he spends a year fulfilling a role well below his station and gets no closer to getting back onto the grid.
So if not Mercedes, where else? The options aren’t nearly as sparkling — or all that different from this year.
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SAUBER
Out of contract: Zhou Guanyu
Alfa Romeo will end its sponsorship of F1’s only Swiss team at the end of 2023, from when it will be known as either Sauber or Audi pending the completion of a sale deal to the German auto giant.
That’s the pitch right there.
Sure, Audi’s investment and power unit program won’t really come on tap until 2026, but some of the benefits of a sale that’s rumoured to already have been completed will start to trickle through before that, and a three-year deal would make him a factory driver for the famous four rings in his final contracted year.
But there’s no guarantee the seat would be open to Ricciardo,
Zhou Guanyu has acquitted himself very well this year, and strong progress in 2023 would force Sauber to choose between a young driver on the up and one who’s sat out of the sport for a season.
There’s also the wildcard of Sauber junior Theo Pourchaire, whose star has faded somewhat in his second unsuccessful F2 season but who would be in play if he were to storm to the title next year.
All that said, Ricciardo’s body of work on the track and marketing star power off it would make a powerful case, particularly if Audi wanted a charismatic face for its first F1 foray.
At this stage it’s impossible to say whether Sauber can move forward in the midfield next season or will continue sliding backwards, as it has done through the year, but if it does consolidate, it may be a credible option.
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HAAS
Out of contract: possibly Kevin Magnussen, second seat not yet contracted
Haas is reported to have reached out to Ricciardo when it seemed clear he was on the ropes at McLaren, but Guenther Steiner has suggested the team never got a follow-up call once the news was made official.
The fact that a Haas seat is unsigned at the moment but Ricciardo is choosing to take a year off suggests it’s low on the list of preferences.
But that may not necessarily be the case in 2024.
Haas had made significant strides between last season and this, capitalising on the new regulations to move back into the midfield. It’s been chronically inconsistent ever since the start of the year, but there’s clearly great potential in the car when everything clicks.
By skipping 2023, Ricciardo will have a chance to observe whether Haas’s revival this year is credible and sustainable or just a flash in the pan.
If the American team does lift next year to become a consistent points-getter, then a Ricciardo-Haas tie-up makes sense on several levels. Ricciardo is probably the best-known F1 name in the United States after Lewis Hamilton and one of the world’s most popular Formula 1 racers. He also has a clear affinity for the States and would feel very much at home in the sport’s only American team.
Haas is also a famously non-political environment. It’s one of the most open and honest teams in the paddock and has tended not to over-PR its drivers, something that’s sure to be music to Ricciardo’s ears.
The only potentially complicating factor is who gets the seat next year. A renewal for Mick Schumacher would likely be for only a year, but the rumour that Nico Hulkenberg could usurp the German could mean that seat is locked down for an extra season.
Magnussen could theoretically make way, but having turned to the Dane in a pinch when Nikita Mazepin was dropped at the start of the season, it would be bold to punt him for a second time without a clear performance reason for it.
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ALPHATAURI
Out of contract: Yuki Tsunoda and possibly Nyck de Vries
It’s extremely difficult to envisage either side of this equation thinking that this is a good idea considering AlphaTauri’s modus operandi is to blood drivers in Formula 1 for possible Red Bull Racing promotion.
That said, Nyck de Vries has been hired for 2023 despite being very experienced in other categories and having never been in the Red Bull program. And at 28 years old next year, he’s hardly a young up-and-comer — indeed he’s only a little more than five years younger than Ricciardo.
Nonetheless, it’s too difficult to imagine such a reunion.
WILLIAMS
Out of contract: one seat not yet contracted
As with Haas, the fact that Ricciardo has turned down Williams this year makes it difficult to believe he wouldn’t do so again the following season.
Only a barely explicable massive step forward next year would make this an option, but given it’s debatable whether Haas is capable of such a big movement in a single season, the chances of Williams pulling it off are remote.
These are the only seats out of contract at the end of 2023, though there’s always the chance of sudden openings through retirements or relationship breakdowns.
Either way, taking the year off will at least allow him to weigh up his offers fulsomely — a luxury he arguably didn’t have when he made the sudden and ill-fated switch to McLaren given the world was in the grips of the first months of the pandemic.
But are the options any more open than they were this season? With the exception of Mercedes, they’re almost identical.
But what we don’t know is what Ricciardo’s mindset will be looking at 2024. As he said, absence makes the heart grow fonder, and after a season on the sidelines he may be so eager to return that options that look unappealing today might suddenly be attractive.
But the eight-time race winner’s priority is to find a way back onto the podium rather than just onto the grid, which means he must hope the next 12 months in the driver market look different enough to the last 12 months to bring him back to the sport rather than let him fade undeservingly into obscurity.
