How de Vries made himself impossible to ignore for a belated F1 chance

There were only two blots when Nyck de Vries made his Formula 1 debut as a super-sub in this month’s Italian Grand Prix. He left the Williams in the wrong brake-bias tune in Q2 to induce a spike of oversteer when he stamped on the anchors approaching the second chicane. Then, under the controversial race-ending safety car, he “erratically” and suddenly slowed. But, owing to his green status, his efforts to manage a cooked front brake disc and his unfamiliarity with the dash readout, the stewards let him off with a reprimand. As a result, de Vries could gingerly free his aching shoulders from the cockpit of the FW44 with those two points for ninth place intact and his F1 stock soaring. It was just about the best real-world audition imaginable.

Williams chief Jost Capito now reckons “there is nothing else he has to do” to stake a claim for a full-time drive in 2023. And perhaps that’s just as well. Despite Mercedes F1 boss Toto Wolff fighting his cause at every opportunity, de Vries has so far struggled to be much more than a blip on the radar for teams with a seat going spare. The Dutchman was at least in the frame to replace George Russell at Williams for this season before the squad signed the more experienced Alex Albon – who de Vries replaced at Monza with a couple of hours’ notice before FP3 after the Anglo-Thai was struck with appendicitis.

There seem to be three major factors why de Vries has failed to secure a full-time F1 berth beyond his standing as Mercedes reserve. Firstly, he needed three seasons to gain his Formula 2 coronation – generally seen as at least one too many to be heralded as ‘the next big thing’. Secondly, during that 2019 term he triumphed over a level of competition that might best be described as ‘middling’. The runner-up was Nicholas Latifi, who de Vries would vanquish in Italy during their weekend as GP team-mates, and whose time in F1 is now up after Williams announced the pair would part company at the end of 2023. That F2 campaign also came hot on the heels of a stellar 2018 for the junior series, when Russell led Lando Norris and Albon, while de Vries ranked fourth.

Also against de Vries is his age in a warped world where Max Verstappen was only 17 years old when he started his first GP. Already de Vries is 27 and has three years on the reigning champion, Charles Leclerc and Russell. All told, he isn’t the next or a lost world-class talent. But the Italian GP ‘driver of the day’ has shown that he would be an improvement for Williams over Latifi and that he is experienced, decorated, and ready to do a decent job in F1.

De Vries stunned Williams on his F1 race debut with points in the Italian GP

Photo by: Williams

De Vries and his management might even argue that his age is a virtue. Thanks to ascending the single-seater ladder, working for crack Formula E squad Mercedes, plus his exploits in LMP2 and role as test driver for the Toyota Le Mans Hypercar programme, he’s immensely knowledgeable and adaptable. That manifested itself at Monza. De Vries, who ran in FP1 for Williams at Barcelona in May, had been driving for Aston Martin on the Friday in Italy before switching last-minute from green to blue overalls. Granted, the shared Mercedes power unit and gearbox meant plenty of carryover. But aside from quipping about the risky position of the fire extinguisher button on the steering wheel, it took no time to adjust to the Williams systems and procedures.

With the team already knowing his seating position and pedal placement from Spain, de Vries could hop in and determine that, aside from a front-wing-angle tweak to make the car a little less pointy, his driving style and therefore desired set-up were very close to Albon’s. The rapid acclimatisation was helped in some ways by his age, which had allowed already for a varied career.

So strong was his outing that de Vries is also in the frame now for the vacancy at Alpine...and pre-empting that scenario, Helmut Marko has even been on the phone should Yuki Tsunoda require a new team-mate at AlphaTauri for 2023. Something about F1 drives being like London buses…

It was also complemented by de Vries’s personality. He is affable enough but intensely demanding – not afraid to say what he wants, and he knows how to get it. Dave Robson, the Williams head of vehicle performance, describes him as “pragmatic about what is possible. The vast majority of the time he is right, which is how a good, competitive racing driver should be.”

The team reckons Albon would have been quicker still than de Vries in qualifying, despite the debutant returning 13th in the session before being bumped up to eighth on the grid owing to the litany of penalties. But that prediction was mainly based on Albon’s experience. The far greater challenge came on Sunday. De Vries was artificially promoted and had quicker cars coming from behind, in addition to the usual challenges presented to a debutant in having to navigate the formation lap, race start, pitstops and so on. All this made his effort even more worthy.

De Vries became the first Formula E world champion in 2020-2021, before helping Mercedes clinch both world titles again this season

Photo by: Andreas Beil

Those who have followed de Vries’s career will have observed a driver who doesn’t leave an inch. So much so that, in the closing laps in Berlin last year on his way to becoming the first-ever Formula E world champion, he began unnecessarily squeezing his team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne. He then opened the subsequent press conference not jubilant about his achievement but seething about driving standards. De Vries has high standards, and he expects it of others too.

When it came to his F1 cameo, he raced smart. He wasn’t a rolling roadblock courting blue-flag controversy when Carlos Sainz, Lewis Hamilton and Sergio Perez surged past after their grid drops. The instruction from the pitwall was “be mindful of those quicker cars coming through”, but he was hardly a lamb to the slaughter. De Vries defended stoutly where appropriate, and tucked into a handy DRS train to keep tabs on those ahead. He was faced with an ambitious strategy that required speed and sound tyre management, even if the late safety car offered respite to the flag. Given this all came after no high-fuel running in practice, it was a deeply impressive showing.

Capito reckoned: “I wouldn’t say I was surprised, but he did an absolutely outstanding job and I rate him extremely high. So that’s why my expectations are extremely high and he over-fulfilled these. His feedback is fantastic. He is so good a race driver and it helps that he has driven so many cars, so he knows exactly how a car feels – what is good and what is not good. He’s excellent.”

That kind of testimony, and the positive data from Monza, arrives after Williams’s American F2 protege Logan Sargeant suffered a slump at the crunch point of the season. As a result, in the battle to replace Latifi, de Vries has moved into pole position for 2023. In fact, so strong was his outing that de Vries is also in the frame now for the vacancy at Alpine, should the team at the centre of this driver-market silly season fail to land Pierre Gasly – he was one of three drivers to test the 2021 A521 last week at the Hungaroring, where it won in the hands of Esteban Ocon. And pre-empting that scenario, Helmut Marko has even been on the phone should Yuki Tsunoda require a new team-mate at AlphaTauri for 2023. Something about F1 drives being like London buses…

Despite being parachuted in as Albon's replacement, de Vries demonstrated his racecraft and skill to hold his own in F1

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

From having the door to F1 closed, de Vries now has three possible ways into a full-time seat. Williams is the more familiar option and will likely come with something longer than a one-year deal. Alpine, though, can offer a route to making those points scored at Monza a more regular occurrence, although that would mean breaking away from the Mercedes umbrella.

“Hopefully I will get a shot next year,” says de Vries. “This world is very volatile and it’s not only merit that counts. So, it’s out of my control. I can look back on a proud debut and first moment in Formula 1. Any time you get a chance to drive a Formula 1 car, it’s a kind of job interview and audition. You’ve got to take those opportunities, but you’ve also got to use them sensibly because there’s always a trade-off of doing too much and too little. But I am just grateful that it worked out well and played into our hands.”

"Throughout all of our careers, he was always one of the very best and there’s no doubt he deserves a place in F1" George Russell

The votes of confidence also come from higher up the grid. Compatriot and “great friend” Verstappen had been singing de Vries’s praises. Meanwhile, Russell reckons the Italian cameo was more impressive than the Brit’s own Mercedes debut in the 2020 Sakhir GP. Of the two-time world karting champion, Russell says: “Throughout all of our careers, he was always one of the very best and there’s no doubt he deserves a place in F1. Not everybody gets an opportunity but certainly now, he’s proved everything he has to. To score points on your debut in a Williams, it’s pretty spectacular.”

Verstappen’s and Russell’s glowing praise came in the post-Italian GP podium press conference. Should de Vries gain a plum F1 seat, he’s unlikely to make an appearance in that top-three Q&A. He’s not the white-hot property that Oscar Piastri is. Nevertheless, his time for F1 has surely come.

What will the future hold for de Vries?

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images