DANIEL Ricciardo is Formula 1’s most entertaining star – and his rollercoaster career hasn’t been short of drama either.
While the Aussie racer has won eight Grand Prixs, last August he hit a career low, getting ditched by McLaren and failing to secure a seat for the 2023 season.
However, this weekend the 34-year-old is set to make a sensational F1 return with AlphaTauri at this weekend’s Hungarian GP, having filled Nyck de Vries’ spot for the remainder of the season.
Away from the grid he’s one of the most popular professionals in the sport – regularly pictured larking about with the likes of former team mates Lando Norris and Max Verstappen, and new team mate Yuki Tsunoda.
No doubt fans will be thrilled to see Daniel – nicknamed the Honey Badger – back, especially with glamorous girlfriend Heidi Berger in tow.
And despite his dip in form, some reports suggest Ricciardo is still worth an impressive £38million – which means he’s been able to maintain a very luxurious lifestyle while away.
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Here, we take a closer look inside Daniel’s lavish life away from the grid, including a £15million property portfolio and a very, very impressive multi-million pound private car collection.
Love in the fast lane
When Daniel was dropped by his team last year, at least he could rely on the support of his super stunning girlfriend, Heidi, 26.
She already knows a thing or two about the F1 life too, as her Austrian father Gerhard Berger is a retired driver, who competed for 14 seasons.
Speaking last year on the Fitzy & Wippa podcast when asked if he was in love, Daniel said: “Yeah mate, I’m in love, I got a good thing going, so yeah. I’ve got a good balance in life right now.
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“I think love eliminates stress, yeah absolutely.”
Actress Heidi, who studied at New York University, has posted plenty of photos from the track presumably supporting her beau, and while the couple are incredibly private, they went public with their romance last August.
They were spotted enjoying a getaway to Venice in May, and also shared a special intimate moment from the romantic holiday on social media last month, showing they’re still very much loved-up.
£15m property empire
Regardless of form, a career in F1 can be short-lived, so Ricciardo has already made the sensible move into property investment, and boasts a staggering £15million portfolio already.
He owns a one-bedroom pied-à-terre in Monte Carlo, which is home to plenty of other drivers including Max Verstappen and Charles LeClerc.
Speaking about the Monaco Grand Prix, Ricciardo said: “It feels like a real racetrack, and I’m not thinking ‘there’s a cafe I eat at’ or ‘there’s a street I ride my Vespa down’ or whatever.
“You wake up in your own bed, kick around your apartment and then start the journey to work.”
Not forgetting his roots, Daniel also has an impressive abode in his native Perth, Australia, which is said to have an underground garage (of course) and pool.
Even more impressively, he also snapped up a stunning five-bed, five bath mansion in Los Angeles in 2018.
As a result he is said to enjoy spending most of the summer in LA, telling the West Australian: “The weather, having the beaches close by, I feel like you can escape the madness of it all.”
He paid a whopping £10million for the modernised 1960s Beverly Hills home, which also has an outdoor pool and a two-door garage for his luxury cars.
Multi-million pound private car collection
Unsurprisingly given their need to impress on the race track, F1 drivers are also known to boast very impressive private car collections – and Ricciardo is no exception.
Speaking about his passion for motors to Top Gear, he said: “I am fascinated by some modern cars and how close they can be to a race car.
“If I accelerate away from a set of traffic lights in a quick car, sure it feels fast, but I’m not exactly high-fiving my mate in the passenger seat.
“That’s why I’m starting to warm towards the older stuff. It’s completely different. The H-pattern gearboxes, the vibrations and all that – I appreciate that.”
He often drives a McLaren 720S, said to be worth around £215,000, and when he’s back in Australia, he cruises around his hometown in a Toyota HiLux – his first car and a gift from his parents.
He also owns an Aston Martin Valkyrie, reportedly worth a whopping £2.5million, a Porsche 918 Spyder and a Porsche GT3 RS.
Luxury holidays
For work Daniel obviously has to travel the world, but when he’s not racing he also enjoys the finer things in life and visiting exotic locations.
Last year he went Instagram official with Heidi while holidaying in the US, where they enjoyed hiking in the mountains and horse riding, and earlier this year they were pictured looking loved up in Venice.
Previously he’s been seen living it up onboard a yacht in the Mediterranean, and earlier this year he was spotted partying in Las Vegas.
And it seems Ricciardo made the most of his break away from the track, recently writing in a LinkedIn post: “This is the first year in as long as I can remember that my goals aren’t going to be 100 per cent about racing and competing.”
Either way, it seems he was always destined for this career, saying: “Two, three years old, I’ve got faint memories of being at the track, putting the earmuffs on and that was like the first kind of attraction where I was kind of like scared by the noise.
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“But I also loved it, because I knew that represented like the speed and there was excitement that was with that.”
Source: Motorsport - thesun.co.uk
