Daniel Ricciardo’s final Formula 1 race weekend could have been handled in a better way, his former RB team has admitted.

The Australian was dropped by RB after the Singapore Grand Prix in favour of Liam Lawson, as the squad wants to evaluate the New Zealander’s potential to see if he could be a candidate for Red Bull in 2025 or 2026.

But although the decision to make the driver switch was made well in advance of Singapore, the development was kept quite secret, with there being no confirmation from the team nor Ricciardo over the Marina Bay weekend that he was definitely leaving F1.

So when it became clear post-race that Ricciardo’s career was over, there was a backlash from fans who suggested that Red Bull had given the eight-time winner a disservice by not allowing him a proper send-off.

However, as Motorsport.com revealed, the reality was that Red Bull representatives had spoken to the Ricciardo camp ahead of the Singapore weekend to see if there was interest in him announcing the news before track action got underway, but it was decided not to go ahead with this plan.

Reflecting now on the events of the Singapore weekend, RB team boss Laurent Mekies says that in hindsight, it may well have been better to have done things differently.

“Yes, it was frustrating, and yes, it was not ideal to go through the weekend in that way,” said Mekies. “That is first of all for him, on a professional and on a personal matter, and for the whole team around him.”

Daniel Ricciardo, RB F1 Team VCARB 01

Photo by: Lionel Ng / Motorsport Images

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Mekies confirmed that talks took place before Singapore about how things should play out in public, but once it was decided to keep things secret then both team and driver had to play along with it.

“Daniel was aware,” he added. “We did have discussions before the weekend. For many different reasons, we chose together to go into that weekend without announcing. And from that point onwards, we had to deal with it.

“It’s a decision that, in hindsight, we may or may not do differently. But it’s something that we were, both the team and the drivers, on board to go through that now.”

However, although the way the weekend was handled was far from perfect, Mekies still thinks that the message got through to Ricciardo about how much he was loved and respected by fans and those in F1.

“I think in one way or another, we all found a way to express how much love there is from the sport to Daniel, from the fans to Daniel,” he added.

“I don’t know if it would have been better or worse [to announce it], certainly different, more traditional, but I can hopefully say that the amount of love and empathy we felt through that weekend was something outstanding and something that shows that he’s bigger than an F1 driver, he’s bigger than F1.”

Thierry Neuville has explained his two off-track excursions that cost the World Rally Championship title favourite the lead at the Central European Rally. 

The Hyundai driver started Saturday with a 6.4s lead over Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier before two spins on stage 11 dropped him to fourth, behind rivals Ogier, Ott Tanak and Elfyn Evans, 33.6s in arrears.

The two errors could impact the WRC title fight with championship leader Neuville needing to outscore Tanak by two points to seal a maiden crown this weekend.

Neuville first’s spin arrived when his i20 N touched the grass, pitching the car into a 360-degree spin. After recovering from that moment, he then ran wide at a left-hander and onto the grass, losing even more time when his car briefly became trapped in a ditch.   

The Belgian admitted conditions were much trickier than expected as morning fog had made the road much more slippery. 

Neuville wasn’t the only driver caught out, as M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux, Gregoire Munster and Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta endured adventures onto the grass.   

“It was two spins I mean the first one was a basic spin and the second one the pacenote was too fast,” Neuville told Motorsport.com.

Thierry Neuville, Hyundai World Rally Team

Photo by: McKlein / Motorsport Images

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“It was a long corner and you don’t see the exit very well because it is uphill and when I entered the corner, it turned more than my pacenotes told me. I tried to save it [the car] and getting out of the ditch we got stuck a little bit and we lost time. 

“Obviously it was going well but there were tricky conditions out there and there were lots of surprises. 

“The first stage was a real surprise I didn’t expect such conditions so it was much more tricky than expected and then we had two little mistakes. We are still here and the rally is not over.”

Neuville admitted that his weekend plan has now changed given the deficit to the lead group. As it stands, he will score 10 Saturday points five fewer than Tanak ahead of Super Sunday, where 12 points are on offer.   

“We can’t catch anybody anymore so now we have to get through the afternoon secure some points and look forward to tomorrow,” he added. 

New rally leader Ogier was among the few to avoid an off-road excursion across the morning’s three stages, although the eight-time world champion admitted the conditions were difficult to judge.

“It has been a challenging morning. We also had a little moment,” said Ogier.

“It surprisingly started very dry with quite good grip and, of course, you attack and have confidence and then you approach the sections where there is a bit more humidity and it was easy to make mistakes. 

“I think many drivers went off the road and into the field. We are happy we managed ok and could get back in the lead.”

Maverick Vinales did not shy away from the hand gesture he made at a motionless Marco Bezzecchi following the pair’s high-speed crash in the latter stages of Saturday’s sprint race at the Australian Grand Prix.

The factory Aprilia rider had qualified third on the grid for the Phillip Island race but was unable to maintain his position at the start, losing several places to eighth, a position he held for five laps.

Then, amidst crashes and overtaking, Vinales began to make his way up to sixth, behind VR46 Ducati rider Bezzecchi. But despite being the only frontrunner on the medium rear tyre, the Italian fought tooth and nail until the incident on lap 11, two laps from the end of the sprint.

Vinales overtook Bezzecchi approaching Doohan corner and pushed hard under braking, but the Italian lost his reference and didn’t brake where he was supposed to, slamming into the Aprilia from behind.

Both went into the gravel at high speed, fortunately, without serious consequences in terms of injuries, despite Bezzecchi lying still for a short while following the crash. Both riders were conscious after the incident, although Bezzecchi was taken away on a stretcher.

A statement from the Aprilia team said that Vinales was “transferred to the medical centre where he was examined following the contusion of his left elbow. No fractures were reported, but an additional ultrasound exam subsequently highlighted modest post-traumatic swelling. For this reason, the Spanish rider will undergo anti-inflammatory therapy.”

Vinales was confident of racing on Sunday when he spoke to the media. He also explained how events unfolded from his point of view.

“When I crashed I felt a cramp and then I couldn’t feel my hand,” revealed the Spanish rider. “That’s why I was a bit scared.”

Maverick Vinales, Aprilia Racing Team

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

“Bezzecchi must have misunderstood the braking point. We spoke and he told me that he would come and talk to me afterwards. Let’s see what he says.”

Further conversation was not possible in the immediate aftermath of the race as Bezzecchi went to hospital in Melbourne for further checks. For this reason, Bezzecchi’s point of view and any possible sanction from race direction will also have to wait until Sunday.

Following the initial checks performed at the circuit’s medical centre, Bezzecchi is understood not to have any fractures.

After the crash, with Bezzecchi lying motionless on the ground, Vinales showed him the middle finger, which attracted some criticism.

“I get thrown off at 300 kilometres per hour – what am I going to do, give him a kiss?” was Vinales’ comment on the matter. “At home, I would have done something else.”

Eight-time world champion Marc Marquez said he regarded the crash as a racing incident.

“If you look at it, it looks like it’s Bezzecchi’s fault, but for me, it’s a racing incident.

Marc Marquez, Gresini Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

“In 2017, I had exactly the same situation. I overtook using the slipstream, but then when I arrived at the braking point the wind pushed me out.

“You don’t want to go into the middle of the track because you know that with these bikes if you go in front of the guy you are overtaking, the slipstream sucks the second guy.

“So you never want to be in front because you know it’s a dangerous situation for you. But today the wind was pushing laterally and I think Vinales could not avoid that movement while Bezzecchi couldn’t avoid the sucking.

“But guys, we are riding at 320km/h, shaking, and it’s windy at the end of the straight. So for me it’s a racing incident.”

The first Ferrari Challenge qualifying run of the day for the Coppa Shell AM grouping took place under mainly appalling weather conditions, with the pouring rain making it a complicated session, which was interrupted to allow the track to dry out.

A few minutes into the session, Race Direction put the red flags out after two Ferrari 296s (one of which the #171 of frontrunner Andrea Levy) ended up against the inside wall, at the entry to Tamburello.

After an interruption of about 15 minutes, qualifying resumed with track conditions better but still tricky, and leaving no margin for error.

Lap after lap, a drier line appeared and the times started to come down. With the chequered flag fast approaching, Eric Cheung (Formula Racing) set the quickest time of the session, the only driver able to lap under 1m56s.

The Canadian’s time of 1m55.728s was almost four-tenths quicker than second-placed Roland Hertner (Gohm Motorsport), who looked certain to take the pole right until the end.

Third place went to Shair, who finished ahead of Coppa Shell AM Europe champion Zois Skrimpias, Jan Sandmann and Henrik Kamstrup. These are the six drivers qualifying for this afternoon’s Superpole, the classification of which will make up the first three rows of the grid for tomorrow’s Ferrari Shell AM World Finals.

Although the top-6 had an international flavour about them, they all came from the Shell AM Europe class, while those from the North America section struggled a bit more in the conditions and were further back in the final standings.

Andreas Koenig (Ghom Motorsport) was the first non-Superpole qualifier in seventh, ahead of Shintaro Akatsu (Ineco), Stephen Earle (Kessel Racing) and Norikazu Shibata (Cornes Osaka), who wrapped up the top-10.

Runaway Phillip Island sprint winner Jorge Martin has admitted it was “a relief” to discover that Marc Marquez had lost ground at the first corner and was thus unlikely to be a threat in the 13-lap race.

The Gresini Ducati rider quickly recovered from running wide at Doohan, making it back to second place on lap eight. But Pramac Ducati’s Martin was already three seconds ahead by then with more than half the race gone.

While the crowd was thus robbed of a battle between the two riders who had qualified first and second and who had been the class of the field in Australia so far, polesitter Martin certainly wasn’t complaining.

“I already knew before the race that Marc was [my toughest opponent]. I didn’t know what had happened to him but I saw Bezzecchi behind me at the beginning,” he said.

“This was a relief because I knew that if Marc was behind [me] it would have been a different story. Because he was able to keep the same pace as mine.”

The fastest lap times bore out Martin’s opinion, with Marquez’s best within a tenth of his 1m27.831s mark. Only one other rider, Fabio di Giannantonio (VR46 Ducati), was able to post a lap faster than 1m28s.

Martin believes a stronger showing by Marquez in Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix could have its benefits.

“We will see tomorrow. If he’s that strong [again], maybe he can go into the lead and that could maybe also be good for me. Because I could follow him and try something at the end,” he said.

Marc Marquez, Gresini Racing, Jorge Martin, Pramac Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

Martin admitted to learning a lot from following Marquez at the last event in Japan. In addition, the special nature of the Phillip Island circuit – particularly the difficulty of getting heat into the front tyre – means sitting behind another rider is not as costly as it is at some other venues.

Marquez explained after the race that his problems in the first corner began with a miscalculation of Martin’s braking point.

“Jorge braked super aggressively to disengage the front device. I didn’t calculate this correctly. I almost touched him,” said the six-time MotoGP champion.

“When I reacted it was too late. So I went wide. That small mistake, plus the wind, plus the dirty track out wide, cost me a lot of positions.

“It also cost me the opportunity to fight for first position, but honestly speaking Jorge was a bit faster than me.

“Let’s see if we can avoid that [first corner] mistake tomorrow and fight with him!”

Second place ahead of factory Ducati rider Enea Bastianini nonetheless moved Marquez from fourth in the points standings into a tie for third with the Italian.

With the sprint victory, Martin stretched his advantage over Francesco Bagnaia at the top of the points table to 16.

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