Daniel Ricciardo has put an exclamation point on top of the vicious backhand he sent his detractors following his breakthrough victory on Monday.
The 32-year-old silenced his critics with an impeccable drive to victory in the Italian Grand Prix at Monza last weekend, helping McLaren secure its first F1 victory in nine years.
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His win included a phenomenal last stint where he produced the quickest lap of the race on the final lap. He has admitted in the aftermath of the win that he threw caution to the wind when he could have coasted to the chequered flag in a deliberate, defiant reminder to those who suggested the West-Australian wasn’t up to it since his move to McLaren at the start of the year.
In a podcast released on Friday, Ricciardo revealed just how stinging he wanted that message to be as he crossed the line for his first Grand Prix win in 1204 days.
It was a very sweet moment.
He said on Barstool Sports’ Pardon My Take Podcast: “I don’t like talking about myself and I’ll try and make it not sound arrogant. But, because for me it had been three years and it’s been a tough year and there were still people surely questioning my ability.
“Putting in the fastest lap of the race in the last lap where the victory was in my hands, that for me was like a little thing to say, ‘Guys I did not feel the pressure this whole time’.
“Just for my piece of mind I’m going to set the fastest lap just to say, ‘I told you so and go f*** yourselves’.
“It was my way of saying I love the pressure.”
He had revealed on Thursday radio messages from McLaren teammate Lando Norris saying Ricciardo was driving “too slow” also inspired him to push for the fastest lap.
Ricciardo had struggled to adapt to the MCL35M throughout the first half of his maiden season at McLaren, and was repeatedly bettered by Norris on race day. But not at Monza.
Following the dramatic crash between Max Verstappen and seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton on Lap 26, Ricciardo realised his teammate was getting a little too close for comfort.
During the race, Norris suggested on the team radio that he was driving faster than Ricciardo, and pondered whether he should try and overtake him.
“There was one lap in particular, not long after the restart when I let (Norris) get too close and I probably gave him the impression I was maybe not that fast. And I think that’s when he probably said, ‘I want to try and attack Daniel’,” Ricciardo said in an interview with the BBC.
“I could see in my mirrors, Turn 2 into Curva Grande and into the next chicane, he was probably even closer than I let Max get at the start of the race.
“I was like, ‘OK, I don’t need to be saving (tyres) this much’, so then I kind of turned it up a little bit. With the restarts and the craziness of the racing these days, I was always trying to save a little bit, just in case there was another restart.
“Could I have won by 20 seconds? I’m not saying I could have, no, but I was just doing what I had to.”
Ricciardo threw caution to the wind on the final lap of Monza, proving he was the quickest driver on the track by claiming fastest lap of the Italian Grand Prix and clinching a valuable extra point for the constructors’ championship.
And there was a defiant reason he wanted to end on a high note with his final trip around the circuit.
“It was to remind people that I haven‘t forgotten (how to do it),” Ricciardo explained.
“I was in control and I just wanted to show it was the last lap and I am not feeling any of the nerves or pressure so I am going to do my fastest lap of the race on the last lap, just to remind people, ‘I got this’.”
Ricciardo now sits eighth on the drivers’ standings with 83 points, still comfortably behind fourth-placed Norris on 132.
“There are people who have been at this team a long time, long before even I started racing, and the last eight or nine years there has been drought,” Ricciardo told the BBC.
“So to come back and especially for the ones that have stuck through the thick and thin, it‘s awesome. It’s cool.
“I‘ve obviously had some personal struggles with the team this year from the performance point of view, but now to come out of that with this result, it makes me appreciate what I have at this team and playing a part now is quite fulfilling.”
The F1 season resumes on Sunday, September 26 with the Russian Grand Prix, which is scheduled to get underway at 10pm AEST.