Red Bull boss Christian Horner has praised Pierre Gasly for how he has performed since returning to Toro Rosso back in August.
The Frenchman became just the second driver to be demoted from the senior team, ironically the other being his current teammate Daniil Kvyat, but since then has scored three top 10’s.
And commenting on what has likely allowed Gasly to once again show the potential which earned him the Red Bull seat in the first place, Horner pointed to one crucial factor.
“Obviously for Pierre, it was very tough for him coming into the start of the season off the back off two accidents in pre-season and that I think definitely affected his confidence,” he said via Crash.net.
“Of course being teammate to Max Verstappen is a very tough job to have, having that reference point and for Pierre, it was a difficult first half of the season for him.
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“We felt that with the pressure building on him, the public pressure, the media scrutiny, it was right to remove him from that and put him into the slightly less pressured environment of Toro Rosso, and since that switch, I think he has driven again exceptionally well,” the Briton added.
“You can see his confidence is growing. He’s driven some very strong races and his pace is getting better and better. He looks happier in that environment, which is good to see.”
Gasly’s latest strong performance came in qualifying at the Brazilian Grand Prix, as he led the midfield pack in seventh.
“I’m really happy with how qualifying went today,” he stated. “I’d like to pass on a massive thanks to the team for giving me a competitive car.
“It feels like pole position for us today as P7 in the midfield is the best we can expect. We knew it was going to be a tight qualifying, so it feels great to get my fourth Q3 in a row.
“I felt good in the car all weekend, now we need to stay focussed for the race and finish the job by scoring as many points as possible.”
Responding to Horner, Gasly also conceded that returning to Toro Rosso was probably the best move for him.
“I’ve been fast every single year in my career, so I knew what was not going right during these six first months,” he accepted.
“When I got the news [of the demotion] I was confident that coming here I would be competitive again.
“To be fair, I wasn’t really surprised. Of course, you want to be consistent, it’s difficult coming with a new car and not knowing what to do and it takes some time to really adapt to it.
“But I think I’ve been fast since my first season in single-seaters so I wasn’t surprised to be competitive in the Toro Rosso again.”
