Yuki Tsunoda has taken Formula 1 by storm, from his Grand Prix debut in Bahrain followed by a slew of incidents raising questions about his readiness for the top flight.
But AlphaTauri team boss Franz Tost, who's worked with the best during his vast motorsport career, is a big believer in a driver he says oozes natural talent, a victim of his inexperience and the manner in which Young Guns are fast-tracked into modern F1.
The 21-year-old rookie is up against Pierre Gasly, at the peak of his talents and growing in stature, and stats after nine races show the Frenchman on 39 points and the Japanese youngster on 9.
Undeniably quick, able to shade his more experienced teammate on hot laps but has been wayward in race mode. A rough diamond needing some serious polishing would be a fair half-term report assessment.
Tost spoke of his charge in Austria: "Yuki is a rookie and he is coming new in Formula 1 and I believe for these young drivers it is really difficult to come into Formula 1, because at every race track on every race weekend they do the first time their qualifying there.
"Of course, you can say they did FP1, FP2, FP3 they must know where to go. But, for example, the wind is increasing or coming from a different direction or the track is hotter or colder, so many things are changing.
"When I remember back to the accident in Paul Ricard when Yuki crashed, we had some understeering problems in FP3 and we decided to give more front wing to do the work on the front suspension.
"He came to this corner, turned in, and then the car reacted a little bit more than he expected, came over the kerbs and there was also some wind direction change and he crashed.
"You cannot teach this to a young driver, he has to learn in every qualifying session what to do on this track and therefore experience is so important. Yuki is improving really well and the complete process is absolutely in the right direction. He didn’t change the approach. He already had a good approach.
"But as he is now, he has much more time with the engineers, because he is living in Faenza. Every day he is spending hours with the engineers. This helps him to understand the car from the mechanical side, from the aerodynamic side, how to use the power unit.
"The power unit is not only giving you the power, it is helping under braking, with the MGUK and so on and so on. The young driver has to learn this. But it is not only for one track always the same. Every track in a different way how he can use the power unit.
"And there are different corners and you can’t expect that a rookie knows everything from the very beginning onwards. That’s why I always say a young driver needs three years to understand this complicated Formula 1, because Formula 1 has become much more complicated than it was years before. I am very happy with Yuki;.
"He shows fantastic natural speed and he is improving day-by-day, session by session and I am quite optimistic that we will see a very good second half of the season and that Yuki will also be successful in the future," predicted Tost.
Tsunoda's shenanigans have drawn regular headlines, so much so that Red Bull's veteran Sergio Perez has reached out to his junior team colleague.
Tost explained: "It was always the case in the past that the two drivers worked together because they are coming from the same family but it’s really positive if such an experienced driver like Pérez or Max is giving some advice to the young drivers.
"This helps enormously because they know exactly how to help them and where to advise them in the correct way," said Tost.
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