27/10/2017
NEWS STORY
At a time Force India is understood to be calling off its team orders directive and allowing its drivers, Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon, to race one another, the Frenchman has revealed that he has received death threats.
"I was expecting a bit of a tough welcome this week looking at all the Twitter messages I received," he told reporters in Mexico City, "which was crazy... and all the death messages as well. But actually I had a very warm welcome from the beginning. Let's see if it continues. I hope it will."
Asked if he felt the threats were serious he replied: "It was messages on social media. I don't know if you take that seriously or not."
The Frenchman subsequently revealed that ever since the infamous clash in Baku he has received "many" such threats.
"I think the last one was yesterday," he added. "But, apart from Twitter, in the real world everyone welcomed me very well and they are pushing for the team as well, not only Checo."
Asked if the threats had unsettled him, he admitted: "It's never great to receive things like that. But it's all fine at the moment so I hope it stays like that."
On hearing of the threats, Perez insisted that there is no reason his fans should be bad to his teammate.
"Obviously they will support me a lot here but I see no reason why they should be bad to him," he told reporters. "If anything, every event we have done so far they have been very good to him, not only to him but to everybody else. They really like the sport and at the end of the day it's just a sport and that's how it should be.
"We obviously had a bad relationship since Baku and especially we hit a very low point in Belgium," he explained. "But afterwards we had a good conversation between us, no one else was involved there in the team. I think since that point everything has changed you know. The atmosphere, not only between us but also the engineers and everyone, is really good.
"Obviously, you want to beat each other," he admitted, "but it's important to have that respect. I think that respect is in place now. It's something that makes me happy and the atmosphere is good. I don't think the fans will be bad to Esteban."
Referring to team orders, the Mexican said: "In Austin and in Japan, for example, we knew that the priority was to secure fourth place in the Constructors', which we are very close to doing so. So that's the main priority.
"Then I think we have to gain the trust back; to show the bosses that we can race without any trouble. That's the main priority."
Asked, following claims from within the team that the pair will be frre to race this weekend, he said: "That I haven't heard. You heard it first. But probably yes, we should be able to race here."
Check out our Friday gallery from Mexico, here.