Ricciardo's bizarre, emotional F1 send-off eclipses Norris' Singapore win

SINGAPORE -- Lando Norris laid down a marker of how real his championship challenge is with his dominant win at the Singapore Grand Prix, but the headlines by Sunday evening belonged to his former teammate Daniel Ricciardo.

Aside from a close shave with the wall at Turn 10 on Lap 45, Norris' victory was nearly flawless. McLaren had greeted his win at the Dutch Grand Prix in August with a social post that read simply "statement," but this was arguably a bigger one given the level of his performance across the weekend and the setbacks he had encountered at the two races between Zandvoort and Singapore.

The victory consigned several narratives of Formula 1's recent news cycle to the scrapheap.

Norris always bottles it when starting from first? He nailed his getaway off the line from pole and held the lead into Turn 1 and still had it by the end of the first lap -- the first time he'd done so in eight attempts.

What about in-form teammate Oscar Piastri, dubbed F1's champion-in-waiting after his spectacular Baku win seven days earlier? Still true, and the Australian demonstrated his overtaking prowess in his late charge back from sixth to third, but stick the Piastri hype on the backburner for the forseeable. Norris continues to be the more polished of McLaren's two drivers, and he looked the class of the field throughout the weekend.

Norris clearly turned up to Singapore with a point to prove. "Just chill out, bring this car home," race engineer Will Joseph nervously instructed him toward the end, adding later "full concentration now, take a drink," suggesting Norris was asking more of the car than he needed to with such a healthy lead. His final winning margin of 20.945 seconds, F1's equivalent of a 4-0 win in football, could have been even bigger and underlined the advantage McLaren has enjoyed for months.

Mathematically, Norris, now 52 points adrift of Verstappen with six races and two sprints to go, is still the underdog in the championship battle, but the invaluable combination of momentum and the better car are firmly on his side in the run-in.

More might have been made of Norris' dominant win -- and, more importantly, his deficit would have been 51 points -- were it not for the subplot that developed in the closing laps, one that in itself was tied to another of the stories that lingered in the days leading into Sunday's race: the future of Ricciardo and the fastest lap he claimed on the race's final circuit that appears to have capped his Formula 1 career, robbing Norris and McLaren a bonus championship point in the process.

Pitting late to challenge for the bonus point for fastest lap is commonplace in F1; drivers often do it when they have enough of a gap to the car behind to pit for fresh tyres without losing a position. It's rarely done when you're 18th and a lap down on the leader, though, as Ricciardo was when RB called him in. A fresh set of soft tyres and a clear track in front is an almost slam-dunk fastest lap, and Ricciardo obliged with style.

The bonus point is only awarded if you set the fastest lap and finish in the top 10, so Norris simply lost the point. RB had no reason to bring Ricciardo in to try for it at the end bar one obvious motivation: RB's senior team, Red Bull, is locked in a fight with Norris and McLaren in both the drivers' and constructors' championships, and the late Ricciardo stop opened up suggestions of collusion between the energy drink giant's two F1 teams.

It was also likely the final act in the career of the popular Ricciardo, who, despite never living up to the form he showed between 2014 and 2018 at Red Bull, has remained one of F1's most popular drivers despite a topsy-turvy second spell in the sport.

Ricciardo's bizarre farewell

The Ricciardo situation has been strange all week. On Thursday, questions were being thrown his way about reports published after Baku's race that he was set to be replaced by Red Bull reserve driver Liam Lawson after Singapore. Red Bull declined to give any clear answers, because there was no clear answer. Sources have told ESPN that Ricciardo is part of a wider power struggle between Red Bull team principal Christian Horner (who wants him to stay) and racing advisor Helmut Marko (who does not), but the company refused to confirm or deny that or next steps all week.

Ricciardo's underwhelming form this year had strengthened the Ricciardo Out camp in recent weeks, but the lack of clarity around the situation felt messy and counter-productive for the driver. Sources close to Ricciardo were upset that Red Bull had let him go into the race without the situation resolved.

Both teams suggested that Ricciardo's late stop and the fastest lap that followed were akin to a "thank you and good luck" to the eight-time race winner. When asked after the race if there had been any coordination between Red Bull and RB about Ricciardo's late lap, Horner replied with one word: "None." He added: "Daniel obviously wanted to finish the race on a high. You'd have to ask [RB] about that."

RB stated that Ricciardo's late glory run had been simply with goodwill in mind.

"Given this may have been Daniel's last race, we wanted to give him the chance to savour it and go out with the fastest lap," RB team principal Laurent Mekies said in a statement.

It was the closest anyone at Red Bull has come, on record, to acknowledging Ricciardo might be on the way out. It already appeared likely he would make way for Lawson in 2025, but events behind the scenes have accelerated that switch.

On RB's statement, a cynic might point out that it's hard to imagine the team suddenly feeling the urge to give Ricciardo the same send-off had the bonus point been with Verstappen or Sergio Pérez instead of with Norris. Given that Red Bull did not even give Ricciardo the courtesy of clarifying the situation before the race, it's a hard statement to take seriously.

McLaren CEO Zak Brown said he will seek clarity on the situation around Red Bull's two teams.

"That's a nice A- /B-Team sporting thing that I didn't think was allowed ... but hey, that's not the first time we've seen it, probably won't be the last," Brown told Sirius XM after the race. "I'll certainly ask some questions. It's something I've spoken about in the past and I think it illustrates that it does happen, because I think you wouldn't have made that pit stop to go for that. It's not going to get anyone a point, so I think it does illustrate the issue around that topic."

At the start of the year, Brown flagged concerns about Red Bull and RB sharing the same owners when the latter started moving some of its operations from Italy to Red Bull's UK base in Milton Keynes. It's likely Brown will raise the issue again after Singapore.

As for Ricciardo, while no one at Red Bull was willing to state the obvious, it was clear the Australian felt like he had just taken part in his last F1 race. One source with knowledge of the situation told ESPN before the race they were "98%" sure Ricciardo would leave RB -- a different source said after the race they were "99%" sure -- but Red Bull's entire driver situation has been foggy and difficult to read for months, and until a press release comes out confirming the news, it is impossible to say with absolute conviction it is happening.

By Sunday evening, it was clear Ricciardo knew which way the wind was blowing. His interviews after the race were full of emotion; he was holding back tears as he spoke to F1's Lawrence Barretto in the TV pen shortly after the race ended and was clearly doing the same in others. Speaking later to the written media, he sounded philosophical about his second stint in F1.

"I'm proud of the career. I tried to become world champion, I tried to become the best at something in the world," he said. "I think it is a tall task that we ask from ourselves, some achieve it, some don't, in the end if I came up a little short I also cant be too hard on myself, happy with the effort I put in and for that there's no sadness or feeling or regret or what could have been."

After being swamped by selfie-seeking fans on his walk back from likely his last media interview to RB's hospitality centre, he was greeted by an impromptu guard of honour by the team's guests from that weekend. RB teammate Yuki Tsunoda came to say goodbye before leaving the circuit. Ricciardo spent a while on the deck of the hospitality unit hugging and shaking hands with various people. It had all the feeling of a going-away party.

A timeline for the announcement that most expect to follow, that Lawson will replace him from the U.S. Grand Prix onward, is unknown even by people within both Red Bull and RB, with three weeks until the race in Austin.

"Well, we've now got a period of time where we'll evaluate all of the relevant performances of the drivers," Horner said on Sunday. "It is 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."

If there is any controversy around the lap in the weeks after Singapore, it's unlikely Ricciardo will care. In the manner that has endeared him to millions of fans around the world as the face of Netflix's "Drive to Survive" series, the Australian made several quips about the obvious potential ramifications of the lap.

play

0:43

Emotional Ricciardo fights back tears after potential last race in F1

Daniel Ricciardo speaks about his future in F1 after the Singapore Grand Prix.

Speaking with the written media on Sunday night, he said: "Kinda hoping Max wins by a point now as I've guaranteed myself a very nice Christmas present ... so, sorry Lando!"

He joked again later, adding: "I heard something about a $3.5 million bonus for fastest lap? Red Bull was throwing some crazy number around!"

It might seem inconsequential, but the F1 drivers' title has been settled by a point or less on nine different occasions since the inception of the world championship, most recently in 2007 and 2008. Ironically, McLaren found itself on either side of the coin on those occasions.

The fastest lap also ensured that, mathematically, Verstappen can afford to finish the remaining six races and two sprints in second position and still win the championship. When ESPN later asked Verstappen what Christmas present he would get Ricciardo if he beats Norris by a single point this year, the Dutchman laughed and said, "He can have anything he wants!"

Verstappen also paid tribute to his former teammate in a way that suggested he does not expect they will share an F1 race track again.

"I have to thank him for the fastest lap," Verstappen said. "He's a great guy, honestly. We always had a great relationship. We had a sporting rivalry in the team. He will be remembered as a great driver, as a great person also. He has a great character. I think it's very rare if someone hates him. So yeah, I mean, I think also in a few years' time when I won't be here anymore, we'll sit back and look at all those years together and have a beer together."

Ricciardo told Sky Sports that Verstappen had been the only driver to text him after the Japanese Grand Prix, another point in the year when reports suggested that he faced the axe, telling him to keep his head up and that he deserved to be in the sport.

Once the emotion settles, there might be a tiny sense of final satisfaction for Ricciardo that it came against Brown's team, which cut him loose after the 2022 season following a torrid run of form, two years into a three-year deal. McLaren's decision to do so paid dividends and opened the door for Piastri's elevation to F1, but sent Ricciardo the other direction into what for a brief spell looked like a retirement from F1. Red Bull revived his career by bringing him back into the fold for 2023 as reserve driver, which quickly became race driver when he replaced Nyck de Vries at that year's Hungarian Grand Prix.

But the obvious next step never materialised. Ricciardo always set his sights on replacing Pérez at Red Bull and reclaiming the seat he gave up at the end of 2018 by moving to Renault -- one of the great sliding-doors moments of F1's recent history and one that will go down as one of the worst moves in recent times given that it came three years before Verstappen's first title -- but his failure to find a consistent vein of form meant that never materialised.

F1 fans voted him Driver of the Day for his final outing, something he was grateful for at the end.

"I'll be honest, I don't think the Driver of the Day normally means much to us drivers," Ricciardo said. "It's nice, but it's not something to brag about, but I think today ... the fans read the media and know this could be my last one so I think that's a really nice gesture from them and today it is appreciated.

"I do acknowledge that, I thank them for being a part of it and acknowledging my efforts and my love for the sport. Obviously there were times it tested me and I wasn't always grinning ear to ear, but I felt like I always tried to have as much fun with it and leave as much as I could on track."

A third chapter in Ricciardo's F1 story looks unlikely at this point. On Sunday, he reiterated that he has no interest in staying in F1 unless he has race-winning machinery.

"For me, if I'm not able to fight at the front with Red Bull, I have to ask myself what am I staying on the grid for, that's something I've also come to peace with," he said on Sunday.

Ricciardo, who most journalists would agree is one of the easiest and most straightforward drivers to deal with in the paddock, will be missed by the sport. A case can be made for his early departure; beyond all the interviews and marketing days, F1 is and will always be a results-based business, and they just had not been there for him at crucial times. Qualifying on Saturday in Singapore was a prime example, when he exited at Q1 at what seemed to be the worst possible moment to deliver that kind of performance.

Assuming the reports of his early departure are correct, though, the reaction to the final laps of his Singapore Grand Prix prove his popularity has endured through it all. Many will say he deserved a better and more dignified goodbye, and it's hard to disagree.