F1 News
Tost reveals which drivers from his team were the fastest
- Cas van de Kleut
On Wednesday 26 April, it was announced that AlphaTauri team boss Franz Tost will leave his team after this season. In his years as team boss of Red Bull Racing's sister team, he has had quite a few good drivers in his team.
Those drivers include Max Verstappen. The Dutchman is currently actively pursuing world championships. After 2021 and 2022, he is now in contention for his third world title. The Red Bull Racing driver has won 37 races so far, and stood on the podium 81 times in 167 race starts.
Sebastian Vettel is another driver Franz Tost has seen pass. Indeed, the German even gave the team then called Torro Rosso its first victory, at the Monza circuit in 2008. Vettel has since retired from Formula 1 racing, but with four world titles, 53 wins and 122 podiums in 299 race starts, the former Ferrari driver has had a memorable career. Soon, he will make a one-off return in a Formula 1 car.
'Verstappen and Vettel fastest'
Tost told the press conference for the Miami Grand Prix that the two world champions were therefore the best drivers he has had in his team: "They were the fastest, because otherwise they would not have won so many races and championships. There were other drivers who were not much slower, but they were just in the wrong team at the wrong time, or something like that. But Verstappen and Vettel were the fastest."
The aim of AlphaTauri, is for young talents to get the chance in Formula 1, and then be able to move on to Red Bull Racing. Tost therefore says that looking back, this has succeeded with Vettel and Verstappen: "But there were also some other drivers. They were really fast, like Carlos Sainz, like Pierre Gasly, Ricciardo, Daniil and now Yuki Tsunoda. And there are a couple of drivers, they really improved a lot in the time when they were in our team. And they did a very professional job, they developed themselves. And that's good to see."