Daniel Ricciardo used to rank the US Grand Prix among his favourites on the calendar and, while he's not on the grid anymore, he's still making the most of the circus being in town.

The popular Australian F1 driver turned Ford ambassador was out in Arizona over the weekend for the third Raptor Rally, where Ford Raptor owners came from far and wide to congregate in Lake Havasu.

With that event all wrapped up, Ricciardo and co. packed up and hit the road for a road trip over to Austin, Texas to jump in with the USGP festivities.

Probably a fairly short hop, right? Not so much. Lake Havasu to Austin will actually put something like 1,200 miles on your odometer – in other words, nearly five times the distance between the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia and the Singapore Grand Prix, which Valtteri Bottas cycled earlier this month.

Ricciardo 'can't wait' for Austin road trip

Ricciardo's lifestyle brand Enchante posted a video of the Aussie climbing into his Ford truck after the weekend's event, captioned: "Raptor’s packed. First stop, the Nellie E Saloon. The long road to Austin starts now."

The Enchante founder wrote in a note: "Last night we kicked things off in Lake Havasu at the Ford Raptor Rally, and in a couple of days we're taking the long way to Austin. And I mean the lonnnng way. Desert, backroads, swimming holes, all of it. Not gonna lie, I can't wait."

Enchante and Ford Racing are hosting a pop-up event in Austin over the course of the race weekend, but it's unclear whether or not the former Red Bull and McLaren driver will attend the track itself.

He and his company were in attendance in Austin last year but, just a year after he was pushed out of the door and his racing career ended, he chose not to actually rock up at COTA at any point.