‘Selfish’ Daniel Ricciardo has ‘permanent timing problem’ in F1 career, says former boss

Former Renault F1 boss Cyril Abiteboul has branded Daniel Ricciardo “selfish” for the nature of his exit from the team at the end of the 2020 season.

And he believes the Australian has developed a habit of making bad career choices, claiming that Ricciardo left both Renault and McLaren too soon.

Ricciardo rocked the F1 world when he decided to leave race-winning Red Bull in the summer of 2018, signing a lucrative contract with midfielders Renault.

Cyril Abiteboul reopens Daniel Ricciardo wounds

After a challenging first season at Enstone in 2019, Ricciardo claimed two podium finishes for Renault in the pandemic-affected 2020 campaign, which began after he had already signed a deal to join McLaren.

Despite ending McLaren’s nine-year win drought at Monza 2021, Ricciardo struggled almost throughout his period with the team before agreeing to terminate his contract at the end of last year. McLaren have since emerged as the closest challengers to 2023 World Champions Red Bull.

Abiteboul was enraged by Ricciardo’s decision to walk away from Renault before his second season with the team had even started – and has reflected on the affair in an appearance on the Dans La Boîte À Gants podcast.

He said: “He makes his decision 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.”

Having become accustomed to winning races for Red Bull, Abiteboul says Ricciardo initially struggled to adapt to midfield machinery in his first year at Renault, referring to an error-strewn race in Baku – where he reversed into Daniil Kvyat after both drivers went down the escape road – as a particular low point.

He explained: “The team was in the process of structuring itself and getting organised. We’re making progress, but that means we’re not at Red Bull’s level. He came from the standard environment, Red Bull, and so inevitably there was a feeling of being demoted.

“It was difficult for him psychologically. In 2019, the Baku Grand Prix was absolutely horrendous, with him making mistake after mistake. In short, he’s completely out of his depth, and that’s complicated for us.

“I didn’t think it would be this difficult in 2019 and, conversely, I didn’t think that in 2020 there would be Covid, a global pandemic that would block us, and during which he would decide to end his contract at the end of the year. I obviously don’t see that happening.

“And I don’t see it happening either that we [would] have such a good year in 2020, all the same, with podiums and a car that once again, by making a few less mistakes, could [have finished] third in the standings.

“After that, at some point you have to bounce back. And it’s complicated because we issue very cold, very harsh press releases where you can feel the feeling. What’s more, Netflix is probably filming the show at the time, so they’re telling it differently afterwards.

“And the 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, [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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Abiteboul, who left his role as Renault team boss at the end of 2020, admitted that he signed a driver of Ricciardo’s calibre too soon in Renault’s development as a team and left his own position exposed as a result.

Reflecting on the day he reached an agreement to sign Ricciardo in 2018, he said: “I know deep down that it’s too soon, even if we can’t say to him: ‘Come back next year.’

“That evening, I went to my favourite restaurant in Marseille with my partner and I said to her: ‘Tonight, we toast two things. One, to the fact that we’ve signed Ricciardo, who’s a great driver. Two, to the fact that in two years’ time, I’ll be sacked’

“Because you sign a two-year contract and I knew that this would ultimately highlight the fact that the team wasn’t yet at the required level and that this could potentially be interpreted as a bad decision.

“Once again, today I have mixed feelings, but on the other hand I didn’t screw up my forecasts.”

Abiteboul is currently the team principal of Hyundai’s World Rally Championship operation, with the Korean manufacturer winning two events in 2023 in Italy and Central Europe.

He also had to lead Hyundai following the tragic death of Craig Breen, the Irish driver who was killed in a testing accident in Croatia in April.

Last month, Abiteboul made another blockbuster capture by securing the signing of 2019 World Champion Ott Tanak, who will return to Hyundai in 2024 after a previous three-year spell between 2020 and 2022.

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