Horner: De Vries was always a stopgap

De Vries was drafted to replace the Alpine-bound Pierre Gasly at AlphaTauri, the Dutchman selected after an impressive point-scoring Formula 1 debut at Monza in 2022, when he replaced an ill Alex Albon at Williams.

But 2023 has been a disappointing campaign for the Formula 2 and Formula E Champion, as he failed to score any points in the first ten races of the season, outqualified and outraced by teammate Yuki Tsunoda.

Just after the 2023 British Grand Prix, the inevitable happened and De Vries was given his marching orders, with Daniel Ricciardo "loaned" to AlphaTauri for the the remainder of the season.

Helmut Marko, Red Bull's consultant, previously revealed Horner did not believe De Vries was the right choice, and speaking in Formula 1's "The F1 Nation", Horner explained his opinion.

"Look, Nyck is a very capable driver and a Formula E champion and Formula 2 champion," he said. "He’s obviously got a lot of experience.

"He’s not a young driver as such, from an age perspective. And I just didn’t see how it fitted within the junior program. It was always a stopgap," he pointed out.

"It was becoming obviously a difficult situation for Nyck de Vries, but there was a high expectation on him because whilst inexperienced in Formula 1, he’s obviously a very experienced driver.

"I think there was a general feeling that Nyck wasn’t quite hitting the mark," Horner continued. "And then the question was what are the options if we were to switch things around? And from a Red Bull Racing perspective, the most interesting option for me was to see how Daniel performed.

"So that was the decision that was made. It all happened pretty quick. And here he is for the Hungarian Grand Prix," the Red Bull boss said.

Horner revealed the best time Ricciardo set during the Pirelli tyre test after the race at Silverstone was good enough to secure a front row grid position, and that convinced him and Marko that it was time to let De Vries go and put the Australian in his seat.

"The test was extremely impressive," Horner revealed. " What impressed me the most when I went up to have a look at the test was, bearing in mind he hasn’t driven this car, hadn’t been in a car for seven months, within his third or fourth lap he was down to a time that was within a second of what our drivers were achieving.

"Then in his first proper run, as it were, on tyres that were comparable, you could see his confidence was growing and growing and that first lap on probably what was his seventh lap of the day would have put him on the front row of the grid. So it was hugely impressive.

"I was just pleased to see that he was still able to operate at that level," Horner went on. "You could see, I mentioned to him ‘that would have put you on the front row of the grid’ and you could see almost the relief in his eyes and almost like the pressure release off his shoulders that he could still do it, that he wasn’t going mad and the old Daniel was still there. And then his long runs were very impressive and the work that he did for Pirelli was absolutely on the money."

Ricciardo was asked how he felt about a drive at AlphaTauri ahead of the test and he approved; Horner said: "Obviously before the test there was some element of discussion with Daniel to say, look, if this goes well, would you be up for driving an AlphaTauri because things aren’t quite going as we’d hoped with Nyck.

"Would you be up for that challenge? And he [said] ‘yeah, absolutely’. He was prepared, if you like, to take a step backwards to try and take two steps forward.

"At the moment there’s only something in place until the end of the season," Horner insisted. "So there’s no thoughts or expectations beyond that. We’ve loaned him to AlphaTauri to the end of the year. Obviously our drivers are going to be Max and and Checo again next year. But it’s always good to have talent in reserve.

"I think Daniel is viewing AlphaTauri, he firmly wants to be pitching for that 2025 Red Bull seat. That’s his golden objective. And by going to AlphaTauri, I think he sees that as his best route of stating his case for 2025," the 49-year-old concluded.