Daniel Ricciardo has looked back on his first year with Red Bull, describing his year alongside Sebastian Vettel as “very easy”.
It was seen as a bold decision to go with the Australian when Mark Webber retired at the end of 2013, who was known as a good qualifier but had question marks over his race pace.
Very quickly that all went away though when Ricciardo claimed second on the grid in Australia in 2014 and would finish second in the race only to be disqualified for a fuel flow breach.
What that race would be was the start of a season where the then-24-year-old largely dominated Vettel, finishing third in the Drivers’ standings behind the dominant Mercedes.
“I remember that it was exciting. I had the chance to drive for a top team and compete with the then current and four-time F1 world champion,” Ricciardo recalled to Motorsport-Total.
“If I could get close to Vettel, people would say ‘This Ricciardo is pretty good’, there was no real pressure, it was just an option for me. It was cool, it was good, I enjoyed it.”
“Apart from the results, I wanted to learn from Seb,” he noted. “I know how meticulous he is and how much he invests in the sport, he lives and breathes Formula 1 and racing.
“I did not want to copy him, but to take some things from him that I found useful, but I wanted to retain my own style.”
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Ricciardo went on to win seven times with Red Bull but would depart after last season as the rising star of Max Verstappen begun to shine over the ‘Honey Badger’.
In 2019, however, many are comparing the success of Charles Leclerc against Vettel at Ferrari, to that the man from Perth had five years ago.
“In a way, the year with Seb was very easy because, as I said, I had no pressure,” he continued.
“I would have expected that it affected Seb harder and he was not always considered a good loser, but we had a good relationship with a good level of respect.
“I looked up to Seb in many ways, he had achieved a lot, but I never thought he was better than me.”
