De Vries on Tost's behalf: 'Context is still sometimes left out'

Nyck de Vries has somewhat downplayed the words of his team boss Franz Tost. In the press conference ahead of the Australian Grand Prix, De Vries reflected on Tost's statements and addressed the atmosphere within the team.

AlphaTauri is not having a great start to the season. After the first two races, Red Bull's sister team is one of the two teams that still have not scored any points. Tost was asked about this recently and joked that he no longer trusts his engineers after they told him the car would be better this year.

"I honestly think the vibe within the team is great and I felt no difference post certain comments that have been made," De Vries commented. "I think things can be taken a little bit out of context. We all want to be as quick as Red Bull that is currently winning and dominating, so we're all kind of trying to improve and work hard to make that progress. We are racers and we are passionate about what we do but I felt no change within the kind of ambience and atmosphere within the team. I'm very happy where I am and I'm sure that we're all very keen to continue to push forward."

De Vries would like to be more in the points

"The vibe in the team is really good," De Vries reiterated. "But we're competitive, and we want to be further up the grid. And we obviously would have hoped and liked that we were a bit more ahead in the fight of points. But hopefully, due the course of the season, we can get ourselves in that place."

Asked if Tost is as strict with his drivers as he is with his engineers, De Vries can only laugh. "You'd better ask Pierre [Gasly] that, I haven't been here that long."