Max Verstappen will run a different number on his Red Bull in 2026, and it came about in the most Verstappen way possible: a quiet word, at the right time, with the one person who could make it happen quickly.
Daniel Ricciardo has revealed that Verstappen sounded him out at the 2025 United States Grand Prix about taking over his old No.3 — and Ricciardo didn’t hesitate to wave it through. With the rules now loosened for 2026 to allow drivers to change their permanent race numbers over the course of their careers, Verstappen finally has the chance to carry the digit he’s long preferred. Until now, the pathway was blocked by a quirk of timing and availability.
Verstappen entered F1 in 2015 with No.33, then switched to No.1 after his first world title in 2021. He kept it until the end of 2025, when he was dethroned by McLaren’s Lando Norris. Under previous regulations, that would’ve left Verstappen in a slightly awkward waiting game if he wanted to move to No.3 — Ricciardo’s number, still effectively “owned” despite Ricciardo’s last race coming at the 2024 Singapore Grand Prix.
But 2026 brings a reset in more ways than one. The updated number rules opened the door, and Verstappen wasted no time trying it.
“It’s good. I got to see Max recently,” Ricciardo told GQ Sports, explaining that the conversation actually started months earlier in Austin. “The number three thing is quite cool. It’s a cool story for us and also fans of F1 who supported Max and I when we were teammates.
“So when I caught up with Max in Austin and when he mentioned he wanted to take number 3, of course I was very, very happy to say yes, because otherwise I think he would have had to wait one more year. It’s a pleasure for me to pass that number on to him now.”
It’s a small detail in a sport drowning in big ones — new regulations, new technical talking points, a fresh chapter in the title fight after 2025 — but it’s also the kind of paddock subplot that lands because it’s personal. Numbers are supposed to be branding, but in reality they’re identity, superstition, and memory wrapped into one. Verstappen swapping to No.3 isn’t going to make his RB quicker, yet it still tells you something about how he sees this moment: not as a comedown from running No.1, but as an opportunity to do things his way.
Ricciardo, for his part, is now watching from the outside. He announced his retirement from motorsport in September 2025 and has since taken on a role as a global racing ambassador for Ford — a neat bit of symmetry given Ford is now Red Bull’s engine partner. The two were reunited at Ford’s season-launch event earlier this month, but the number conversation traces back to that Austin weekend, when Ricciardo was around the United States Grand Prix and spotted at a pop-up store for his Enchante lifestyle brand.
There’s also something fitting about Ricciardo being the one to sign off on it. Their three seasons as Red Bull team-mates from 2016 to 2018 remain a reference point for the Verstappen era — before the titles, before the team was built entirely around him, back when there was genuine intra-garage friction and two very different approaches to the same job. For fans, that period still carries a particular energy: Ricciardo’s looseness and late-braking swagger, Verstappen’s raw speed and inevitability, and the sense that you were watching the future arrive at full volume.
Ricciardo has repeatedly hinted that while his F1 chapter is closed, the competitive itch hasn’t exactly disappeared — it’s just been redirected. After driving a Ford Raptor T1+ at an event late last year, he admitted off-road racing has started to tug at him, with the Baja 1000 floating around as a possible target.
“The itch for Baja is there, but I’ve got a lot to learn,” Ricciardo said. “A few more of these events and then ask me next year and we’ll see where I’m at!
“For me, it’s all about having fun. That’s always been my approach. In my racing career, I think people related to me because they saw how much joy I brought to it and the competitive side was almost secondary. I just wanted to enjoy it. I’m taking the same approach with this new role. It’s a completely fresh start.”
And maybe that’s why this number handover works as a story: it’s not dressed up as some grand ceremony, or a nostalgia tour, or a marketing push. It’s just two former team-mates, one asking a question, the other saying yes — and in the process, creating a neat little bridge between two eras.
For Verstappen, No.3 will be a new look on the car in 2026. For Ricciardo, it’s a reminder that even after the last chequered flag, he still has a place in the sport’s bloodstream — even if it’s now as the guy who helped write the footnotes rather than the headlines.
