McLaren CEO Zak Brown has openly admitted that parting ways with Daniel Ricciardo was a difficult decision, despite reports of criticism.
At the conclusion of the 2022 Formula 1 season, Ricciardo departed McLaren after learning that his contract would be terminated one year early to make room for fellow Australian driver Oscar Piastri.
This left Ricciardo without a seat for the 2023 season, leading him to re-join Red Bull as a reserve driver. However, he made a return to the grid in July 2023, stepping in to replace Nyck de Vries at AlphaTauri.
Ricciardo has recently voiced his disappointment about being let go by McLaren, along with the accompanying criticism. However, Brown has emphasised that the decision was far from easy.
“Breaking up with Daniel was very difficult. You know, love Daniel. Great guy,” said Brown to the Track Limits Podcast. “It just didn’t work out, but that wasn’t the master plan in the end, so that was a very difficult situation.
“Especially, something like that is very public and then everyone has their opinions, and 99% of them don’t actually know what’s going on behind the scenes.
“So, to get accused of certain behaviour…where they’re just not informed, and that’s the nature of the beast when you’re in the spotlight. Everyone has an opinion, but they don’t have the facts, so that was very difficult.”
McLaren future
Brown also discussed the current McLaren lineup, highlighting the shift from pairing Lando Norris with Ricciardo to the new partnership with Piastri.
“I don’t think necessarily that [Piastri] brings something different but Lando hadn’t been challenged by his team-mate the last couple of years on a regular basis,” Brown added.
“On a side note, great to see Daniel doing so well at AlphaTauri because he’s a great, great guy, won me my first race.”
Brown also mentioned that Piastri is now keeping Norris on his toes following his sprint race victory at the Qatar Grand Prix weekend, especially considering Norris currently has no win in F1.
“However, I believe Oscar is making Lando stay alert,” Brown remarked. The advantage, in my opinion, is that they both think our race car is pretty similar, so their input is consistent.
“The last thing you want to happen is to have two drivers, and one of them reports understeer, while the other claims oversteer. At that point, what should you do?
“So, I believe we’re benefiting from having two very technical and quick drivers. We do have an experienced driver and a rookie, the only difference being that our experienced driver is fairly young.”
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