Sebastian Vettel: [...] I am very saddened by hearing whats going to happen to Daniel, I think its a difficult position to be in, I think he's still one of the best drivers, I raced against him I had the pleasure to race against him and the not so pleasurable side of being beaten by him years ago [...] I still think he has very, very much to offer in this regard [...] Mclaren failed to extract the potential that he [Daniel] has. It's sad to see that he's been put in this difficult position. I wish him the very best and I'm sure ultimately the talent he has and the qualities he has will shine through.
TOM: Your retirement started a bit of a domino effect in the driver market. Were you [surprised]?
SEB: [...] To be honest, I didn't really follow any news in the break...
#is it me? am i the drama? i don't think i'm the drama... maybe i am?
A variety of drivers, including ZHOU GUANYU, ALEX ALBON, GEORGE RUSSELL, DANIEL RICCIARDO, MICK SCHUMACHER and ESTEBAN OCON, with a guest appearance made by F1 CEO Ben Sulayem Mohammed, relax on the starting grid ahead of the national anthem at the 2022 Belgian GP
Belgian Grand Prix 2022 (the visor tear-off incident)
were you aware that charles was forced to pit due to a visor tear-off getting stuck in his brakes?
max : “Carlos told me it was the tear-off. I didn‘t know [Charles was forced to pit]. I hope it is not mine! [...] It is super unlucky when that happens. On a track like this you are taking them off really quickly. And that is the worst nightmare. Unfortunately these things do happen.”
Charles post - race debrief
charles : “ .... but um speaking about my race, everything went wrong 😅 [..] and then we had the tear-off uhh from max? i think :D
interviewer: you do have a good relationship with daniel ricciardo. i just wondered what you felt for him, now, in the way that things have kind of unraveled, because he’s still driving at such a high level.
seb: yeah, and i think even if you struggle a little bit, which is fair to say, but there’s more in him and i still rate him very, very high. i find it a bit sad that people lose, i don’t know, maybe their creativity or ideas to extract that potential.
in the end, i don’t think the mclaren team is happy for him to leave. i think it’s the top people calling the shots, which might be less than a handful of people, whereas the rest of the team, i’m quite sure that they absolutely love daniel and are happy to work with him. he has the right approach and mindset, so... yeah, it's a shame that, obviously, it didn't work, but i wish him all the best that he finds a great position in the grid, a great car, to prove what he still has to offer.
you know, age is playing zero, no role at all in this, and the potential he has... i don't know. i think we are living in a very fast-paced world and we forget about a lot of things very quickly. i experienced that, myself, but, then again, everybody is a little bit different.
but, looking back to daniel, he's the only guy who won for mclaren in, i don't know, the last ten years? that's a fact. he had very good races. he had, also, races that weren't very strong and maybe a bit poor, but...
from the outside it's very difficult to judge, but that's exactly what we do-and very quickly, most of the time-judge people, and judge performances, so yeah. hard to really judge from the outside, but obviously i know him well and i wish him all the best.
📷 @.riccsvettel / twitter