De Vries entered F1 on a high after a stunning stand-in performance for Williams at the 2022 Italian Grand Prix.
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Nyck de Vries has had a less than ideal start to his Formula One career. However, his outgoing AlphaTauri Team Principal Franz Tost has publicly supported his Dutch charge, stating that De Vries’ experience in winning races and titles in other categories will serve him well in the future. De Vries entered F1 on a high after a stunning stand-in performance for Williams at the 2022 Italian Grand Prix in place of the ill Alex Albon – De Vries beating regular Williams driver Nicholas Latifi and taking P9, one of only five points scored by the team that season.
However, the going has been tougher for De Vries at AlphaTauri in 2023, with a best finish of 12th – while teammate Yuki Tsunoda has scored both of the team’s points, out-qualified De Vries 6-2, and finished ahead of the Dutchman seven times out of eight. Tost has also coached Sebastian Vettel, Max Verstappen, and Carlos Sainz.
“I always say, it’s really difficult for rookies to come into Formula 1 nowadays,” he said. “Why? Because especially at the beginning of the season, they don’t know all the racetracks. Nyck didn’t know Melbourne, nor Saudi Arabia, nor Miami, and in Baku [where De Vries crashed out] we had the Sprint race, which means that after FP1 there was already qualifying. This makes it, for a young driver who is… new to Formula 1, really difficult.”
“I said to him he should stay concentrated, he should stay confident, because we all know he can do a good job. He won races in Formula 3 and Formula 2, he won championships – he won the Formula E World Championship. That means he knows how to win races and win championships. He just needs to get the confidence – and we have to provide him with a good car.”
Lando Norris described his Canadian Grand Prix experience as enjoyable, despite the unfortunate penalty that knocked him out of the points – while his McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri admitted a few mistakes cost him a top-10 finish. Norris lost seventh place to Piastri at the start, but regained it when Nico Hulkenberg came into the pits. The Briton then passed his rookie teammate for 10th at the Safety Car restart, despite both drivers having just pitted. However, it was later revealed that Norris was being investigated for an infringement under the Safety Car, with the stewards later penalising him for unsportsmanlike behaviour with a five-second penalty.
“I’m not unsportsmanlike,” he said after the race. “Of course, [it’s] unfortunate we got the penalty, but we’ll review that as a team.”
Norris attempted to make his way through the pitch in an attempt to mitigate the effects of the penalty. While he did pull off an impressive overtake on Valtteri Bottas, he was stuck behind Alex Albon and Esteban Ocon in the DRS train. Norris was asked to reflect on his race after taking the checkered flag as the 11th car, which became P13 after the penalty was applied.
“I was happy. It was a fun race. I could do some overtaking, some good racing,” the Brit said. “It wasn’t like the pace was amazing, it was just enough to kind of, at times, catch some of the cars ahead. And when I had a chance to overtake, I did into the hair pain. It was exciting. It was close at times, even with Esteban, in the final corner. It was a tough start, but we came on better and better through the race. It was just enjoyable.”
