RB team principal Laurent Mekies has admitted that Red Bull’s public scrutiny of its drivers can be detrimental, particularly in the case of Daniel Ricciardo, whose Formula 1 future remains bleak.
Speculation regarding the Aussie’s fate was rampant all summer, with predictions ranging from Ricciardo replacing Sergio Perez at Red Bull Racing after F1’s summer break to the 35-year-old losing his driver with RB to Red Bull reserve Liam Lawson.
While neither of those forecasts came to pass, conjecture carried on, fueled in large part by Red Bull’s continuous comments about its driver line-ups for 2025.
Red Bull’s system of moving drivers between its main team and its junior outfit, RB, has long been seen as both a strength and a potential pitfall. It allows for flexibility but has also created an environment of constant pressure, as drivers are aware that their seat is never truly secure.
And the pressure has been especially intense these past months for both Ricciardo and Perez.
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Mekies, while defending the practice of regularly reviewing driver performance, acknowledged that the team’s approach and public discussions placed Ricciardo under undue stress.
“There is nothing wrong with reviewing your drivers’ performance every few races, and I think we have perhaps been too public about it,” the RB team boss told SiriusXM.
“We have done it in the first part of the season, we have done it quite famously just before the summer break, I guess at some stage we have said we will see after Singapore as well to discuss.
“So it’s part of the game. Certainly sometimes you can see it’s probably going a bit too far in terms of pressure, above all for Daniel in that case.”
Mekies empathized with Ricciardo, acknowledging the strain he has endured all season long.
“I think the first thought is for Daniel, because he has had a lot of that this season,” he added.
“Of course, these guys are high level athletes and they know how to deal with it, but sometimes it’s a bit unnecessary.”
While the speculation around Ricciardo's future reached a fever pitch in Singapore, with all signs pointing to the race as the Australian driver’s swansong in F1, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner clarified once again that no decision had yet been made regarding the driver's fate.
The team plans to use the upcoming autumn break to assess the performance of all its drivers before making any changes.
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“We’ve now got a period of time where we’ll evaluate all of the relative performances of the drivers,” Horner told the media at Marina Bay.
“A natural break in the season to reflect on that. And there’s a bigger picture obviously beyond Daniel. So he’s just one part of the jigsaw.”
Horner emphasized that Red Bull has gathered sufficient data on Ricciardo since his return to F1 to make an informed decision.
“I think that we know Daniel very well,” he added. “We know what he’s capable of, how he drives a car. So, yeah, we have that knowledge.”
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