Nyck de Vries was not adequately prepared for his Formula 1 debut with the team, according to AlphaTauri Team Principal Franz Tost.
The AlphaTauri Team Principal feels that considering how competitive the field is right now, Nyck de Vries required further testing before making his F1 debut.
De Vries was replaced by Daniel Ricciardo for the remainder of the season after he fell short of expectations and failed to score in his first ten races.
“I feel a lot of sympathy for Nyck,” Franz Tost opened up on De Vries sacking. “Believe me this was a really very, very tough decision because Nyck is a fantastic person.
“He won the Formula 2 championship and was Formula E World Champion.
“I must say F1 has changed dramatically in the last years. That means, if a young driver comes into F1 he really has to be prepared in a very, very professional way.
“What do I mean with this? Before he comes to F1, yes [he has] the two private tests where he achieves around 5,000km or whatever.
“We did some pilot tests with Nyck at the beginning of the season, but not as much as maybe would have been necessary.”
At the beginning of the season, many of the circuits are not on the junior formula schedule. According to Tost, this makes it difficult for rookies to adjust to the prerequisite demands of the sport.
“At the beginning of the year you have many racetracks where they never have raced before, like in Saudi Arabia, Miami, Melbourne,” he added. “Then we have additional Sprint races like in Baku where you have only FP1 and then you have already qualifying.
“This makes it for a rookie, really, really difficult to show a good performance. The field now in F1 is very, very competitive. There is no driver that does not deserve to be there.”
With only nine points separating 10th and 7th place in the Constructors’ Championship, AlphaTauri is currently in a close battle with Haas, Alfa Romeo, and Williams.
The amount of prize money they win at the end of the season may be significantly impacted by this.
The team has previously lauded De Vries for the high standard of his analysis of the technical aspects, but ultimately they are of the opinion that Ricciardo can get more points in the upcoming races.
“Looking at the second half of the season, this was also an important point in our decision making process,” explained Tost. “Nyck wouldn’t have known many race tracks and this is also a very, very big disadvantage.
“Daniel Ricciardo knows them and therefore at the end, we decided to go with Ricciardo.”
