Franz Tost is not worried about De Vries

Last weekend in Baku turned into a nightmare for Nyck de Vries. On Friday, he crashed during the qualifications for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix and experienced another incident during the race when he hit the inner wall at turn 5, which forced him to retire after the breakage of his left front suspension.

His boss, Franz Tost, showed understanding: “As I always say, there is a learning process and an accident period,” he declared on Saturday in Baku. “Because if drivers don’t crash, they don’t know their limits.”

The Formula E 2020/21 champion is still chasing his first points in Formula 1, just like fellow rookie Logan Sargeant, Williams driver.

The Vettel case before him

The team boss, Franz Tost, defended the Dutchman and made comparisons with a former resident of Faenza, Sebastian Vettel, who also had a tendency to damage his car in his early days before establishing himself as a major force.

There wasn’t a single driver who didn’t crash. I remember Sebastian often coming back without the front nose in the early races. That’s part of the game.

The new sprint format in Baku with only one 60-minute free practice session before qualifying has proven to be an additional obstacle for the rookies, which Tost describes as “problematic.” As I always say, if a beginner comes into Formula 1, they need at least three years to understand what is happening here.

Look at this race weekend format here in Baku now. There are the free practices, then there are the qualifying sessions, and what is problematic for young drivers and rookies is to extract the maximum from the track and tires during qualifying, and it’s really a challenging exercise.

« What happened [in qualifying] with Nyck was very clear. He braked a little too late because he might have expected more grip. Then he lost the car. » Now let’s hope that the learning of Dutch accelerates in the coming weeks.