When Liam Lawson knew he would replace Daniel Ricciardo - and why it ‘wasn’t nice’

Liam Lawson has revealed he knew he would be replacing Daniel Ricciardo at the RB F1 team for around “two weeks”.

It was expected that Ricciardo would be dropped after the Singapore Grand Prix, but the swap was not officially confirmed until Thursday when RB announced Lawson would come in for the final six races of the 2024 season.

Speaking to Newstalk ZB in his first interview since his return to F1 was confirmed, the 22-year-old said he had a fortnight to prepare himself.

“Obviously I knew about it for the last sort of two weeks,” Lawson said.

“But until it’s out there to the world it obviously doesn’t really feel set and it’s not like I could tell anybody.”

Lawson added: “It had been the plan for a long time now, this was sort of where it was leading at least.

“Obviously I had a contract date that needed to be sort of fulfilled.

“So basically it was always going towards this way and then a couple of weeks ago they told me this was what was going to happen and not long after that it was set in stone.”

Asked how it felt being in the RB garage in Singapore knowing that he would be taking Ricciardo’s seat, the New Zealander replied: “Not good, honestly.

“Singapore was definitely not an enjoyable weekend for me, just because obviously we all knew what was coming. And Daniel has always been very good to me in a lot of ways.

“When I drove last year and even this season, I’ve never felt in competition with him or anything like that, he never made it feel like that. So it wasn’t a nice feeling.

“But obviously for me, I get one shot at F1 and it’s come now, and I’m obviously grateful for that opportunity but I now need to take it with both hands.”

Lawson revealed that Ricciardo handled his looming sacking very graciously.

“He said the same thing to me and he said ‘you need to make the most of it’. He did a very good job on the weekend,” he added.

“Honestly, I have a huge amount of respect for how he dealt with everything because I can’t really imagine what that [felt like].

“It’s a similar position to what I was in last year but obviously the guy is just a lot more public, a lot more famous than I am, so he’s getting a lot of questions and trying to sidestep those. He did a very good job.”

Lawson took part in an F1 test over the summer when he drove a 2022 AlphaTauri at Monza.

At the time, the outing fuelled speculation that Red Bull were preparing Lawson to be drafted in amid uncertainty over Sergio Perez’s future.

Lawson confirmed that his F1 drive was not set in stone regardless of how the tests went.

“It was all evaluation days and they were designed to put lots of pressure on me,” he explained.

“It was for an event like this, to throw me in - a bit like last year - mid-season.

“They needed to know that I would somewhat perform. They were definitely evaluation days.”