'It looked like De Vries had already done fifty F1 races'

Praise for De Vries' performance

De Vries did not disappoint in his race debut at Monza, where he crossed the finish line ninth, securing important points for Williams. In doing so, the Dutchman left a deep impression on Bird, who found De Vries driving like an experienced F1 driver. "He looked like he’d done fifty Grands Prix before," Bird said on the Chequered Flag-podcast.

The Formula E driver continued: "He was pressurising Fernando Alonso at one point in the race, he was sticking with the lead group when Daniel Ricciardo was holding everybody up. He looked great out there and I can only assume that there’ll be more chances for him in the near future."

In addition, Bird was impressed by the way De Vries was able to switch between his work for Mercedes and Williams' sudden call-up. "He got into that one day after having his brain put through the fact that he was in an Aston Martin. So, there’s a lot of things that he had to kind of get out of his head then plunk into his head this weekend. Very, very impressive," Bird said.