Ricciardo's Bottas bet lost him €1000

Daniel Ricciardo has revealed that he lost a €1000 bet to Red Bull motorsport advisor Dr Helmut Marko over his belief that Valtteri Bottas would leave Mercedes at the end of last year. Ricciardo has previously revealed his surprise that he did not receive an offer from the Silver Arrows for 2019.

The Australian started 2018 looking likely to be the key player in the driver merry-go-round, with his contract at Red Bull winding down and a seat potentially available at both Mercedes and Ferrari.

The Scuderia replaced Kimi Raikkonen with Charles Leclerc, while Mercedes kept Bottas alongside Lewis Hamilton despite failing to win a race through the year.

And Ricciardo has revealed that the Silver Arrows' push for consistency ended up hitting him in the pocket, as well as triggering his move from Red Bull to Renault.

"He did win €1000," Ricciardo said. "He always wants to bet more – but when he wants to bet more, you know he already knows the answer!

"I'm not a gambling man, I don't really bet or go to casinos. A thousand is not by choice, it's a bit of peer pressure from Helmut."

Ricciardo went on to explain that he had since won the sum back from Marko thanks to his old team's failure to qualify as strongly as the Austrian thought they would in Australia.

He added: "We did another bet actually, I think it was in Melbourne, and I won it back. So we're even.

"It was qualifying, he thought they would be top three in qualifying, and I thought they wouldn't, and they weren't, so I got my money back.

"I don't want to bet with him anymore. But it's OK, if our relationship is like that, it's quite fun!"

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