Heavy rain kept drivers in the garage for most of the final practice of the French GP with Valtteri Bottas of Mercedes ending up fastest in the washed-out third session.
The last time an F1 race was held here at Le Castellet was in 1990 when Alain Prost won for Ferrari.
Ricciardo said he had not directly spoken to rivals Ferrari and Mercedes, but he hedged when asked if his manager had.
Federer, in his first tournament since March, was trailing Nadal by 100 points at the start of the week and is guaranteed of taking the top spot on Monday regardless of how Sunday's final goes.
Mercedes were unable to deliver a reliable engine upgrade in time for the Canadian GP, helping Ferrari return to the top of the podium for the first time since 2004.
The 20-year-old Dutchman is looking to overcome a recent history of mistakes that left him threatening to head-butt anyone who asked about the crashes.
Hamilton insisted that Ricciardo has been performing more consistently and breaking fewer cars in comparison to his team-mate Max Verstappen.
Ricciardo was also fastest in all three practice sessions and the Australian driver will be confident of securing his second win after victory last month in China.
Valtteri Bottas is urging Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton to sign a new contract, even though his own future is uncertain with the team.
Defending champion Lewis Hamilton has won the last two races with Mercedes this season to move 17 points ahead of Sebastian Vettel in their title battle despite trailing by the same amount after the Ferrari driver won the first two of the season.
Hamilton had a time of 1 minute 17.281 seconds at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, with Bottas less than a tenth of a second slower.
Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel, who trails Hamilton by four points in the drivers' standings after four races, was third.
Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen claimed second place after having dropped to 14th following an early collision.
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Ricciardo is out of contract at Red Bull at the end of the season and expressed interest in joining teams like Mercedes or Ferrari to help him challenge for the championship.
Hamilton refused to accept that the uncertainty about his future could be the reason behind his recent slump in performance.
Both Ferrari cars were 0.5 seconds faster in qualifying than either Mercedes, a huge gap in F1.
Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen was the second quickest in both sessions, and in the afternoon he was only 0.007 behind Hamilton.
Raikkonen and Vettel were up front as cooler temperatures and nightfall matched the conditions for Sunday evening's race. Raikkonen's time of 1 minute, 29.8 seconds on the 5.4-kilometer (3.3-mile) desert circuit was a fraction quicker than Vettel's.
World champion Lewis Hamilton must overcome the frustration of being denied victory at the season-opening Australian GP by his own team's careless computer error.
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