"It's funny because the engineers say 'ah, but Lewis [Hamilton] stepped in and [straightaway] started to win'," adds Boullier. "But he did 30,000 miles of testing! They just forget this - they forget how different it is from the junior categories.
"Jumping now from a Formula Renault to F2 is exactly same, except you have more grip and more power. But from F2 to Formula 1 there is the differential, the aero, the brakes, braking by wire, engine braking - it's completely different.
"This guy is just seven races in, and he was not helped by the fact that the first three races he had problems in every session, nearly every run.
"You can see also Stoffel is somebody who is very quiet, very reserved, so I think he needed to have this possibility to talk. And I think he's getting his confidence from the fact he can [now] find a way to share what he wants."