Daniil Kvyat says he will be able to “focus on the right things” at Red Bull after admitting he was keen to prove doubters wrong at Toro Rosso last season.

Toro Rosso selected Kvyat to replace Daniel Ricciardo in 2014, with the Russian driver stepping up from winning the GP3 championship. With the likes of Antonio Felix da Costa and Carlos Sainz Jr overlooked at the time, there were question marks over Kvyat’s selection and he concedes the comments got to him at the start of his career.

“Last year of course there were some moments when they signed me [to drive in] F1 there were a lot of stupid talks going on and of course I wanted to really show good pace straight away,” Kvyat said. “I think I managed that, so now I can focus on the right things again here at Red Bull Racing and that helps a lot because last year went well and now I’m just focused on the job and bring the best results home possible.”

And Kvyat says he has faith in his own abilities, believing that Red Bull has selected him to replace Sebastian Vettel because of the unique attributes he will bring to the team.

“Like every team in F1 also every driver in F1 is different. I will keep doing the things I was doing in the past more or less, with a few tweaks of course because you have to get used to the team and adapt yourself to it. Bring all of yourself, work hard, give the team the right feedback and so on. It’s never very easy for anyone but that’s why I’m here. And of course I’m also different to both of them.”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.

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