Ricciardo clarifies his ‘f****** idiots’ comment
Daniel Ricciardo
Daniel Ricciardo says he regrets his choice of words when speaking about how Formula 1 has shown crashes as part of ‘top 10 moments’ highlights reels.
In the wake of Romain Grosjean’s horrifying accident in Bahrain in 2020, Ricciardo labelled those involved as ‘f****** idiots’ by seemingly glamorising crashes in the sport when putting them in social media compilations.
But while the Australian said his language choice was too severe, the underlying opinion remains.
He believes the sport can do more to highlight on-track achievements rather than when things go wrong for drivers in races.
“I certainly have to be better with my choice of words,” he told reporters in his pre-race press conference for the Made in Italy and Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
“If I could, let’s say, take that quote back, I would. It was too aggressive – I should know better as well, being in the sport as long as I have. I should do better with that.
“Taking that direct comment away from it, what I’m trying to get at is, as an example, I felt last year was such an amazing year for F1.
“There were so many different podium-getters, there was a lot of exciting races – I certainly wouldn’t put it under a ‘boring season’.
“I just felt like there was probably more room to expose the highs of the sport and the great achievements of a lot of individual drivers and individual performances, where there were some spectacular overtakes.
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“I feel like there were better stories to be told as opposed to just crashes. This is obviously my opinion, but I feel like our sport is better than that. I feel like we are better than just showing crashes.
“I feel like we are the most talented drivers in the world and we are driving these amazing cars, so normally a crash is showing less of our talents.
“It’s probably the way the sport’s perceived and about how we are perceived as drivers. We absolutely make mistakes, but I would probably highlight the highs more if I had creative control.
“I don’t know if every other driver feels like that, but it’s obviously how I feel. I’ve apologised, but I would obviously take back the language from those comments.
“That was, overall, my opinion of what I would do if I had the chance to direct it a little bit.”
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