Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo says he is satisfied to finish this year's Formula One drivers' championship as best of the rest behind Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton.
Ricciardo beat the Ferrari drivers and teammate Max Verstappen (who spent the first four races of the season at Toro Rosso) to third in the standings with two races remaining this year, after securing a controversial podium at the Mexican Grand Prix. Mercedes' dominance has made the drivers' title a two-way fight between Hamilton and Rosberg for the last three years, leading Ricciardo to suggest a separate championship for everyone else.
"There should be a separate title in this V6 era for 'best of the rest'," he said. "I could be world champion of the rest ... the peasants' world champion!"
Despite pit stop strategies and errors costing him shots at victory in Spain and Monaco, Ricciardo finishes the season content with his one race win in Malaysia.
"If I didn't have a victory, like if Malaysia didn't happen, then I would look back and say 'Sure, I should have maybe been a multiple race winner this year'. But because I got that victory I'm not going to say 'Oh it could have been better, I could have had two or three'.
"I got the pole [in Monaco], which I hadn't had before, and obviously got back on the top step so for me that's awesome. And peasant's champion, so it's been solid.
"We expected to be fighting in the midfield in the first handful of races this year and we came out with some fourths. Then what was probably going to be a second in China -- that was the third race of the year -- we had the puncture and whatever but it was looking really good. We were like, alright, and it sort of got better so that was really cool.
"The win in Malaysia was epic, the pole in Monaco was in a way my highlight. I obviously didn't tell people but I put a lot of pressure on myself to go there that weekend and execute it. I really believed I could, so for me to do that lap was kind of a relief because I did put a bit of pressure on myself. So that was cool."