The 2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix could be Daniel Ricciardo’s last race in Formula 1.

Whether or not this is his final drive is predicated on an enormous gamble with a slim chance of success.

You know the story by now. Ricciardo’s two years and McLaren have been so battering and bruising that the team will pay him not to race next year.

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Former McLaren driver turned Formula 1 pundit David Coulthard has called for Daniel Ricciardo reappraise some of his life choices in his year off to get back to his best before 2024.

Ricciardo has confirmed that he won’t be on the grid next year after turning down options to race in the lower reaches of the midfield following his sacking by McLaren.

The Australian is targeting a reserve-driver position for 2023, with Mercedes and Red Bull Racing believed to be in negotiation for his services.

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Racing drivers aren’t like normal people.

When a bad case of food poisoning would be enough to keep the average person away from work and in bed for days, the same clearly doesn’t occur to a Formula 1 driver, who feels compelled to ignore the calls for natural recuperation and jump back in the car.

Just ask Lando Norris, who was running as high as third in the São Paulo Grand Prix despite having been unable to eat or drink anything for two days in Brazil.

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Daniel Ricciardo has acknowledged he could be starting the final two races of his Formula 1 career as he prepares for year on the sidelines in 2023.

Ricciardo had his McLaren contract terminated a year early in August and has been unable to secure a competitive seat on the grid for next season.

He’s heavily tipped to join Mercedes as a reserve driver to keep himself in the paddock ahead of an attempted 2024 return.

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The 2022 championship fight has been straightforward in every way its predecessor season wasn’t, with the racing on track largely uncontroversial and the aggro of 2021 almost entirely absent, with only the cost cap fracas briefly disturbing the peace.

But that only rings true if you look exclusively at the battle up front.

Just behind the frontrunning pack, the battle for fourth is anything but quiet.

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Few drivers yet to drive a modern Formula 1 car have had their movements as heavily scrutinised as Oscar Piastri, whose sensational disruption to this year’s driver market as one of the biggest stories of the season.

The Melburnian will move to McLaren next season as Daniel Ricciardo’s replacement, but the timing of his switch from Alpine has been the subject of much speculation given the needle between the two teams and the controversy around his intended split.

But a French magazine has spotted Piastri in a private test for McLaren — albeit with some notable differences to tests set up for other drivers.

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If you had told Emma Gilmour a year ago that she would be driving for the outfit that bears the name of New Zealand automotive royalty, she’d almost have certainly not believed you.

But now Emma is part of an elite line-up of drivers at the Woking-based squad, representing one of the biggest shifts in diversity in motorsport, by being the first female driver to drive for McLaren while repping the New Zealand flag.

Emma sat down with James at the McLaren Technology Centre to talk about her motorsport journey so far, driving at the Goodwood Festival of Speed and not opening her eyes when in a crash.

If you can think of a car, Tanner Foust has almost certainly driven it, almost certainly sideways and probably on camera. So presented with the opportunity to drive the Spark Odyssey 21, there was only ever going to be one answer.

The rallycross and Formula Drift champion, X Games gold medallist, Top Gear host, decorated stunt driver — we could go on — sat down with Off Track to talk about his on and off-track career, turning nerves into speed and his role in Ken Block’s Gymkhana series.

James, Freya and Michael also recap the start of the 2022 season ahead of the double-header in Sardinia.

Daniel Ricciardo has rejected rumors that he could lose his McLaren race seat, reiterating his commitment to the team through to the end of next season.

Ricciardo’s tenure at McLaren has been the subject of intense speculation since the last two rounds in Spain and Monaco, where he was comprehensively beaten by teammate Lando Norris despite the latter’s struggle with tonsillitis and failed to score points, extending his run of dry races to six from seven grands prix.

Pressure was ratcheted up by team CEO Zak Brown declaring publicly that the Australian wasn’t meeting expectations and then openly discussing exit clauses in his contract. But speaking ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Ricciardo said he retained the confidence of Brown and the team and was committed for the long haul.

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Lando Norris took a shock P1 in Friday practice for McLaren, ending Ferrari’s stranglehold on Albert Park ahead of qualifying.

Norris’ hot lap couldn’t be beaten after Lance Stroll understeered into the barrier on the outside of Turn 11 and broke his front wing and left-front corner, causing a red flag and ending the session with less than five minutes still to run.

It compounded a difficult day at an increasingly painful weekend for Aston Martin. Sebastian Vettel also crashed just 20 minutes into the hour, losing control of his car through the fast Turn 9-10 at around 160mph. He skidded sideways through the gravel on the far side of the track, making heavy contact with the barriers and ripping off his right-front wheel.

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You would never have believed this time last year that we’d be talking about a potential derailment of Daniel Ricciardo’s career.

Just 12 months ago Ricciardo was suiting up for his first race as a McLaren driver. He’d spent two years at Renault, where his podium-getting performances in lacklustre machinery burnished his reputation to new heights, and he was starting at Woking as one of the grid’s most highly-rated drivers.

He’d been brought to McLaren to lead the team into its next title-winning era. A proven race winner, he’d get the most from the car and help direct development under new rules.

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Lando Norris will start on pole for the first time in his Formula 1 career after beating the field in a sensational soaked qualifying hour in Russia.

A fresh twist in the tense title tussle wasn’t enough to overshadow a drought-breaking win for Daniel Ricciardo and McLaren on a memorably afternoon in Monza.

Daniel Ricciardo has won his first Formula 1 victory in more than three years and McLaren’s first in nine after feuding championship rivals Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen took each other out in a heavy crash.

Daniel Ricciardo won a thrilling Italian Grand Prix ahead of McLaren teammate Lando Norris after championship rivals Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton came to blows again in a terrifying airborne crash.

The two title protagonists were kept separated in the first stint by Norris, who bottled Hamilton in fourth and split him from Verstappen’s fight with leader Ricciardo, but a slow stop by the Red Bull Racing mechanics conspired to drop the Dutchman off the lead battle.

Mercedes stopped Hamilton shortly afterwards, and his stop was also slow, dropping him onto the track alongside Verstappen as they entered the chicane, the Briton with the inside line and squeezing the Dutchman onto the apex at Turn 2.

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McLaren Racing team principal Andreas Seidl remembers being inspired by Michael Schumacher as a teenager in Germany in the 1990s, makes sense of Lando Norris’s rapid rise in 2021, talks about his confidence in Daniel Ricciardo and reveals the one meal he can’t do without on race weekends

Daniel Ricciardo arrived as McLaren’s 2021 star signing, but the race-winning Australian is at a loss to explain his thrashing at the hands of his junior teammate.

Episode 41 presented by St Hugo, features McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo ahead of this week’s Monaco Grand Prix, joining us to remember his memorable Monte Carlo win in 2018 and the despair of missing out in 2016, discuss what makes Monaco such a challenge and explain why it has been his most successful Formula 1® circuit.