Daniël De Jong delivered by far the best performance of his maiden season in the ultra-competitive Formula Renault 3.5 Series at Monza over the weekend, 14th/15th May, as the home of the Italian Grand Prix hosted the third race meeting of the 2011 championship.Running as support to the FIA World Touring Car Championship, rather than as part of the World Series by Renault package this weekend, the event marked the 18-year-old's first ever competitive experience of the world-famous track and he delivered two tremendous race drives.Getting within 1.8 seconds of pole position in the opening qualifying session, the Dutch student started the first encounter from 25th on the grid but made phenomenal progress and eventually finished in a highly creditable 14th position.Posting a best lap of 1m39.777 seconds, within just half a second of podium finisher's Daniil Move's pace, the Comtec Racing driver showed terrific speed throughout the 28-lap encounter and at the chequered flag a mere 1.4 seconds covered 11th to 14th places over the line.Working with his team to make some changes ahead of second qualifying, the Westmaas-based driver produced a marked improvement in that session to post a time of 1m38.155 seconds - good enough for 22nd place on the extremely competitive grid, just 1.2 seconds shy of pole position.Yet again in race conditions Daniël was sensational and rose through the order into 14th position once more with an excellent performance. Much happier with his car in race two, and his own level of performance, the Karpack, Boix and De Jong ECOCUPS-supported driver took the chequered flag only 0.3 seconds behind the vastly more experienced Walter Grubmuller."Monza was great, other than just three hours of practice it was my first experience of the track", explained Daniël, "We improved the car a lot this weekend and also my driving style is improving all of the time. The first qualifying session wasn't so good but we made some small improvements in the first race and then for second qualifying and race two we had really good pace."Improving with every outing as he gets to grips more and more with the extra 300bhp in comparison to the Formula Renault 2.0 he has been racing for the past couple of years, the rising Dutch star is now looking forward to the next event on the 2011 calendar - the crown jewel of the season, a support slot to the FIA Formula One World Championship in Monte-Carlo on 28th/29th May.On its own, this event would be a massive moment in Daniël's young career but he will have the added pressure of clashing exams over the course of the weekend. Following the FR 3.5 practice sessions on Thursday, 26th May, he will travel back home to The Netherlands for his vital school exams before returning to the principality in time for qualifying on Saturday, 28th May."Monaco will be a really busy weekend for me with my exams on Friday - and we've also had to move another exam so I can race!", he said, "It will be a tough weekend for sure but I'm really looking forward to it, it's going to be a really good experience."