Red Bull made an even bigger mistake than losing Daniel Ricciardo and it’s still haunting them

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Red Bull have made a lot of key decisions that has affected their driver line-up in recent years, with their decision to let one driver leave the stable proving to be an even bigger mistake than letting Daniel Ricciardo go.

Daniel Ricciardo opted to find greener pastures on the Formula 1 grid after expressing his desire for a new challenge.

Feeling overshadowed by Red Bull’s obsession with Max Verstappen, the eight-time Grand Prix winner found a new home at Renault instead.

Ever since the Australian departed from Milton Keynes, Red Bull haven’t been able to pit Verstappen against a driver who could go toe-to-toe with him over the course of a full season.

Isack Hadjar is the next candidate to put alongside the high-flying Dutchman, but their biggest loss in recent years has to be seen as Pierre Gasly.

• READ MORE: Jacques Villeneuve believes Red Bull just made a ‘perfect’ driver decision McLaren would never copy

Will Isack Hadjar suffer the same fate as Pierre Gasly at Red Bull?

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Red Bull made an even bigger mistake than losing Daniel Ricciardo by letting Pierre Gasly go

During the Frenchman’s appearance on F1’s Off The Grid series, he revealed that he had asked Red Bull about a potential return to the main team following his fairytale victory at the 2020 Italian Grand Prix.

While walking F1 journalist Lawrence Bawretto through his trophy cabinet, he stopped at the winner’s trophy he got from the weekend at Monza, before saying, “After that race win, I said, I want a shot back at the main team.

“I want to be fighting for race wins and podiums. It was strange. I still can’t even understand why they didn’t really put me back there, and I didn’t think Red Bull would let me go.

“They eventually did. My manager asked me, ‘Do you actually want to go?’ I was like, ‘100%, no, 200%.’”

To this day, the Frenchman remains the only driver who has been let go from the Austrian constructor since their second-seat woes began to go on and secure a podium at another team on the grid.

Indeed, Ricciardo did go on to win the Italian Grand Prix for McLaren in the following season, but his departure from the team was entirely on his own accord, and not in a similar vein to Gasly’s restlessness at AlphaTauri.

Gasly has shown time and time again that he is worthy of a front-running car through his consistent performances in midfield and backmarker machinery.

Every single one of the five podiums that he has to his name so far have been in F1 cars that have had no right to be where they were at the chequered flag, and it’s no coincidence that he has the most amount of top-three finishes of anyone else in midfield cars on the grid.

• READ MORE: Pierre Gasly reveals Helmut Marko’s brutal message before signing him for Red Bull’s academy

Does Isack Hadjar have the right mindset for his promotion to Red Bull in 2026?

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Red Bull have made a lot of driver blunders in recent years of Formula 1

Gasly lasted just 12 rounds as a Red Bull driver before Helmut Marko decided to drop him in favour of Alex Albon.

Unfortunately for the Thai driver, he was deemed not up to scratch of the Milton Keynes-based squad’s high standards, and he was dropped after 18 months for Sergio Perez.

Perez has arguably been the closest driver to Verstappen’s calibre since Ricciardo’s departure, and that’s something, seeing as the Mexican driver managed to claim just five wins to the four-time world champion’s 53 in the same amount of time.

The biggest mistake that Red Bull made during Perez’s tenure at the team was giving him a contract extension amid his poor performance in 2024.

Initially, Red Bull pointed towards the Mexican’s second-place finish in 2023 as the leading factor for the new deal, but the real reason behind Perez’s extension is down to the fact that they didn’t want to pair their star driver, Verstappen, with Carlos Sainz due to past friction between the drivers at Toro Rosso.

The decision ended up costing the team millions in a severance payout to Perez, and they are still none the wiser on a second driver who can complement Verstappen.