"He trusted my speed the last three years" - Yuki Tsunoda thanks outgoing AlphaTauri team principal Franz Tost

Yuki Tsunoda has talked about AlphaTauri team boss Franz Tost retiring from the sport and how he helped him grow as a driver. Tost will retire from the sport at the end of the season and will be replaced by Laurent Mekies, Ferrari's assistant team principal and race director.

At the drivers' press conference before the 2023 Azerbaijan GP, where Sportskeeda was present, Tsunoda said that he had no idea that Tost was going to announce his retirement. However, he was not completely surprised, as there were murmurs about it:

"It was really surprising news for me. I had, like, lunch with him, like, five days before the news or something like that. And actually, he didn’t mention about those things. So yeah, I was surprised. At the same time, kind of, there was already kinds of rumours from the beginning of the season. So it actually it came true that he’s stepping down."

Yuki Tsunoda wants to make the Austrian 'happy' by performing well in the remaining races and ending the season on a high. He also appreciated Tost for trusting him as a rookie and helping him grow in the last two years:

"There’s 19 races to go to make him happy. Hopefully we can end the season in a positive way for him. To do that, obviously, we need a lot of development we need to do, but, yeah, we have an aggressive plan to do it and looking forward to it."

He concluded:

"At the same time feeling really kind of appreciative to him that he trusted my speed the last three years. And he was always supportive next to me. So, yeah, I’ll try to make it up for him the next races."

---

Yuki Tsunoda provides take on Sebastian Vettel becoming AlphaTauri's future team principal

On the Beyond the Grid podcast, Yuki Tsunoda spoke about how he will miss Franz Tost when he leaves the sport. That was before Tost's retirement announcement.

Moreover, he also discussed how former world champion Sebastian Vettel could become a team manager for AlphaTauri. The Japanese believes that Vettel could also take up Helmut Marko's role as Red Bull advisor: Yuki Tsunoda said:

"That would be really interesting to see how Sebastian would be as a team manager. He can be anything: for example, what Helmut Marko is doing now with Red Bull juniors. I think Sebastian would also be very good at taking care of Red Bull juniors because he's one of the most successful drivers in Formula 1."

Many fans, pundits and drivers see Vettel as a mentor and leader in the sport. Hence, they have speculated about what he could do next now that he has retired.