Ricciardo: 'If I become world champion, I don't know if I will retire'

Daniel Ricciardo will take over from the sacked Nyck de Vries. Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko no longer saw eye to eye with the Dutchman and saw the Formula 1 seat to Red Bull reserve driver Ricciardo. The 34-year-old driver from Perth talks about his retirement plans combined with world titles.

"If I am a world champion, I don’t know if I’ll be retired, because that would mean that things are going well. If I was to win a world title next year, no I wouldn’t retire. But if I was to win one in five years, maybe then I’d be like ‘that’s a great way to sign off," Ricciardo said in an interview with Crash.net.

AlphaTauri driver Ricciardo on world titles

"When you’ve lived on this awesome, euphoric level for so long, the thought of losing that is maybe scary. And I understand that. As long as that’s not the thing stopping you from retiring then you are okay," said Ricciardo.

The good-humoured Australian replaced Nyck de Vries at AlphaTauri because the Dutchman was not performing well enough. With Ricciardo, the Italian racing stable hopes to have enough experience to at least drive in the points this season. Yuki Tsunoda already succeeded, but de Vries has not yet. So it is up to Ricciardo to get points in the remainder of the F1 season.