Daniel Ricciardo appeared on the Ellen DeGeneres Show on Thursday, discussing all things Formula 1.
Ellen admitted that prior to watching Netflix’s Drive to Survive docuseries, she did not know “anything about” Formula 1.
However, since watching the controversial show, Ellen is now a fan, stating that she “could not stop watching it.”
Urging her American viewers to give the “niche” sport a chance, Ellen quizzed Ricciardo on what exactly he does as a driver in Formula 1.
Describing Formula 1 as a “travelling circus of speed and adrenaline”, Ricciardo explained that his job is to “try and drive extremely fast.”
To the surprise of Ellen, who teased that it was comparable to her daily commute, Ricciardo described how driving a Formula 1 car is nothing like driving “to work every day”.
Touching on the physical fitness requirements, Ricciardo explained that drivers “need a lot of core strength and neck strength to basically just hold on”.
“The races are 90 minutes long … there’s what’s called G-forces and because we corner so fast, there’s like four or five Gs on our body, and that is a force which is trying to basically pull us out of the car,” the Aussie said.
“And we can lose up to between eight to 10 pounds (3.5-4.5kg) in a race.”
Ellen was also interested to learn how drivers adjust to their hectic schedules of racing and travelling all around the world.
“Caffeine,” Ricciardo replied with his signature cheeky smile.
“But it’s hard,” he continued.
“You try to adjust a little bit before you get to the destination. So maybe two or three days before your flight, you try to bring your bedtime maybe an hour earlier each night to try and slowly get into it.
“But fortunately, because the sport is so intense and high adrenaline, we can normally operate pretty well with little sleep. That’s what I tell myself.”
Ricciardo will swap the interview couch for the racetrack as he gets back to what he does best this weekend at the Mexican Grand Prix.
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