Ricciardo sees room for improvement: 'Would rather fight for wins'

Daniel Ricciardo 's seat at McLaren is under heavy pressure. It seems that the team wants to buy out his contract to clear the way for Oscar Piastri, leaving Ricciardo to rely on Alpine or maybe even run out of seats. As things stand in the championship, Alpine could be an upgrade for the smiling Australian, who admits he would like to fight for wins again.

Ricciardo may not be able to get involved in the battle for the podium at the moment, but he does note that the racing has become more enjoyable with the new rules introduced by Formula 1 in 2022. "Obviously when it's tight it is fun, of course. It'd be more fun fighting for the wins, the podiums, but the battles we're having are good," said the McLaren driver in conversation with Formula1.com.

Ricciardo on new F1 cars

The 33-year-old Australian stresses that all teams are still in the learning phase and therefore strengths and weaknesses are still clearly emerging. "So like, fast flowing circuits, you've got a couple of teams that are going to be there, and on the tight twisty ones, you know, a couple of others," he continues.

However, teams are still sometimes surprised by disappointing performances at tracks where they should be excelling. "Some weekends you’re still, ‘Okay, yeah, we still haven't completely learned everything that there is to learn yet with these with these cars.’ So, we'll keep going on and see how it goes," Ricciardo concludes.