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Daniel Ricciardo has said that he is not worried about becoming less desirable to teams over a 2019 deal this year. The Australian's contract with Red Bull expires at the end of the 2018 season, and he will be evaluating all of his options before putting pen to paper.
The 28-year-old has been linked with a move away from Red Bull, who he joined in 2014. With team principal Christian Horner admitting that the team will not wait around forever for Ricciardo, the five-time race winner thinks that delaying contract talks with the Milton-Keynes team is a risk worth taking.
"Yeah I’m aware as well that there’s always a risk," Ricciardo said to RACER. "The longer you leave it, then if you’re not performing you’re looking less and less desirable race by race.
"But that’s where I’ve obviously got confidence in my approach and what I’m going to do – and I’ve got confidence that I will be performing. We’ll see what happens after the first little bit of the season."
Ricciardo knows that time for an opportunity at a championship fight is slipping away, recognising that the years left in his career are counting down. However, he remains confident that one day he will claim the sport's ultimate prize.
"Every year feels like a make or break I guess, but obviously each year that passes…" he said. "The older you get, the more you’re like: OK, as opposed to when I had 10 years left in the sport now I’ve only got eight, or six, or four, or whatever.
"So each year does tick by but as far as my performance side goes I’m not worried. It’s more that I want to be world champion before I’ve got grey hair," he added.
Fergal Walsh
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Replies (4)
Login to replyboudy
Posts: 1,168
Makes sense for him to wait a bit.
Samouri
Posts: 25
He definitely will be less desirable if he is outperformed by Max next season.
ajpennypacker
Posts: 2,475
Ricciardo is fantastic and with a proper car he would be fighting for championships. I was concerned by his performance relative to Max last year, but that might have been a bad year, or simply the fact that Max might do the same thing to any driver on the grid. We'll see next year. I'll be disappointed in Ricciardo doesn't beat Max more regularly.
blade
Posts: 341
A big year for RIC, I think he's awesome and on his day, very hard to beat, and certainly very hard to pass - in a top car he will be a force - let's hope RBR start the year well. What was surprising was RIC wasn't able to translate experience into winning more qualifying head to heads against Max - if you take into account the number of mechanical fails in 2017, Max would have pushed him very close to beating him in the standings.... RIC cannot afford a slow start next year.