'Reborn' Ricciardo Happy For F1 Return Despite Unfortunate Circumstances
F1Saturday, 02 December 2023 at 14:00
Updated at Saturday, 02 December 2023 at 18:19
AlphaTauri driver Daniel Ricciardo discussed his injury retrospectively after the last race of the 2023 season in Abu Dhabi.
Despite taking part in only seven races of the 2023 season, Daniel Ricciardo finished 17th out of 22 drivers in the Drivers' Championship.
On the other hand, everything could have been different for the Honey Badger had he not suffered his unlucky injury during the Free Practice session ahead of the 2023 Dutch Grand Prix. As quoted by Motorsport.com, the Australian driver said:
"Obviously, I wish this never happened, just because it was uncomfortable and painful and whatever. But now that it's obviously done, I still look back on this year as a positive. Because sitting here a year ago, I was like, 'could this be my last race?'"
The 34-year-old related to his last race of the season in McLaren, which decided to end his contract season earlier as the team was not happy with Honey Badger's performances. He continued:
"I don't exaggerate when I say that. I really didn't know. I honestly thought it was 50-50. So, to have the year I've had and forget the hand, I just kind of feel a little bit maybe reborn again, is kind of the right word. I feel just re-energized."
Ricciardo's incident at Circuit Zandvoort was quite strange to a casual F1 fan who has seen a lot worse-looking crashes, like Max Verstappen on Silverstone in 2021 or Zhou Guanyu on Silverstone in 2022.
Both of the above-mentioned drivers walked out of terrifying incidents without problems, while Ricciardo seemingly just tapped the wall and could not race for the next five Grand Prix weekends. The Australian explained:
"I could see how maybe some people would see that lame accident with high consequences, 'maybe Daniel should just give it up. 'That's probably just a sign that he should just call it a day.'"
On the other hand, the Honey Badger never felt like that, and he showed everybody what he's made of during an amazing Mexico City Grand Prix weekend when he qualified fourth and finished seventh. Ricciardo concluded:
"But I never thought that. I never felt like that. So yeah, that was maybe even more power to the decision of kind of trying to kick some butt."
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