De Vries felt no confidence from Red Bull: 'That didn't help'

Nyck de Vries had dreamt of an entry into Formula 1 for years, but once it came, it became an adventure soon to be forgotten. Already halfway through his first season at AlphaTauri, the Dutchman was taken out of the car. Helmut Marko even called the appointment of De Vries the biggest mistake of his career.

Talking about his time in F1 is something de Vries hardly ever does. In interviews, he usually stresses having learned a lot and being grateful for the opportunity given. But not everyone is so reticent. Dr. Marko was very critical of the Dutchman, who incidentally never responded to this.

Looking back on the F1 era recently, De Vries did. While the Italian car was far from strong, De Vries still had to perform, he said. "You feel double pressure," the Dutchman looked back in the Cool Room podcast. "you have the media and therefore the external pressure, but you also have the internal pressure. Wherever you go, it always feels like they’re watching you."

De Vries claimed that people were writing about him day and night, which was difficult to deal with. "I just tried to ignore it and not do much. I stopped with reading any news, but you still know a little bit that it is there," he said.

De Vries never really felt the confidence from the team. "From the second weekend you heard those conversations [of being dropped]. that didn’t help me put in my best performance," the Dutchman concluded.