McLaren engineer shares how he reacted when the team dropped Daniel Ricciardo

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McLaren engineer Tom Stallard has shared his initial reaction to the team’s decision to axe Daniel Ricciardo in 2022.

The Woking outfit called a halt to a two-year partnership with Ricciardo and replaced him with Oscar Piastri.

And speaking to BBC Sport, Stallard lifted the lid on his emotions at the time.

Ricciardo arrived at the team at the beginning of 2021 after spending two years at Renault following his shock Red Bull exit.

He joined the team as a seven-time Grand Prix winner and a 31-time podium finisher.

He led home Lando Norris in a one-two at the Italian Grand Prix that year, their first victory for nine years.

However, the significantly less experienced Norris scored the majority of the team’s points, notching 160 to Ricciardo’s 115.

In 2022, the gap widened dramatically as the Briton bagged 122 and the Australia managed just 37 – his lowest haul since 2013.

That led to Ricciardo losing his drive as the team signed F2 champion and compatriot Piastri.

He subsequently spent the first half of 2023 on the sidelines before replacing Nyck de Vries at AlphaTauri midway through the campaign.

Tom Stallard says Daniel Ricciardo exit was ‘frustrating’

Stallard, who worked with Ricciardo during his spell with the eight-time champions, says Ricciardo’s departure took ‘quite a long time to process’.

He found it ‘frustrating’ that they weren’t able to make a breakthrough after working ‘pretty hard’ on solving the ‘puzzle’.

However, he maintains that he still has a good relationship with the 34-year-old after their ‘strong collaboration’.

“When the team decided that they were going to get Oscar instead of Daniel, it took quite a long time for me to process that, because I was so deep into the process of working with him and improving with him all the time,” Stallard said.

“It was frustrating that it ended before we solved the puzzle. I never really lost heart. I never felt like, ‘Oh this isn’t going to work out’.

“This is going to sound weird in a way, but I am quite proud of the work we did with Daniel. We all worked pretty hard on that, including him too.

“We are still very good friends now, I see him at all the tracks. It would be easy to imagine that the opposite would be true.

“Partly it is a reflection on his character, and I would like to think a reflection of the strong collaboration between us, too.”

Will Daniel Ricciardo lose his seat at RB?

Ricciardo has struggled so far in his first full season back at Red Bull junior team RB.

Teammate Yuki Tsunoda has out-qualified him at each of the first three races.

Ricciardo has yet to reach Q3, while Tsunoda has done so twice.

At last weekend’s Australian Grand Prix, the Japanese driver picked up the team’s first points haul of the season by finishing seventh.

Ricciardo, on the other hand, is one of seven who remain scoreless at the foot of the table.

Reports suggested that Red Bull had given him an ultimatum, telling him to improve in the next three races or risk losing his seat.

Liam Lawson, the reserve driver who impressed when standing in for an injured Ricciardo at five Grands Prix last year, is waiting in the wings.

Lawson’s team insisted that they had ‘no idea’ where this story came from.

Nonetheless, Sky Sports F1’s Martin Brundle says rumours are ‘swirling’ in the paddock about Ricciardo’s future.