10/07/2023
NEWS STORY
As Helmut Marko warns Mexican driver to "get a grip", Christian Horner is confident that Sergio Perez will turn things around in Hungary.
Failing to make it to Q3 for the fifth successive race weekend, 2022 Silverstone winner, Sergio Perez didn't make things easy for himself a year later.
Though he was able to turn things around, bringing his Red Bull home in sixth, ahead of Fernando Alonso and the Ferraris, the question, as ever, is what might have been had he started at the front.
On Saturday, Marko sent out a clear warning.
"Perez needs to get a grip on his qualifications," the Austrian told Sky Sports. "Usually, he drives good races, and he's now lucky again as you can easily catch up here.
"It has always been a weakness of his," he added. "It happens too often and he has to work on that. We're also going to work on it, because if one driver is in front and the other 16th, something isn't right."
Speaking after Sunday's race, Christian Horner admitted that the Mexican has to break the run of bad Saturday that began in Monaco.
"He just needs to break it now," said the Briton. "He'll do it in Budapest, I'm confident.
"The way he races, some of his moves, the one on Carlos Sainz in particular was quite stunning into Stowe," he continued. "If you look at his pace in the last stint, he was right there.
"It's frustrating for him that he has to fight back all the time but he's just got to sort his qualifying out on Saturday and as a team we will do our best to support him on that.
"It's just one of those things," he added. "As in all sport, 90% of it is in the head and I think he just needs a good run and he'll find his momentum again."
In the wake of Marko's warning, and the fact that the likes of Ricciardo and Doohan are waiting in the wings, Perez was asked if he fears for his future at Red Bull.
"I couldn't care less if I'm honest about that," he replied. "In F1 in 13 years I've seen it all. I'm not worried about any of that, I'm mainly focused about getting my season back on track and making sure I keep enjoying this."
Referring to the race, he said: "Nothing worked today, I had a great launch but then I got hit by Ocon on Lap 1 and I lost position instead of gaining, so it made it harder the recovery.
"I used too much my tyres in that first stint," he continued, "we boxed, I think three laps before the Safety Car so it wasn't meant to be, but I the end we gave it all and did what we possibly could.
"It was really hard to make progress, especially at the end where everyone is on the same tyre age and there is no tyre delta, it was very difficult to make any progress, because following through high speed is quite tricky. It just makes it harder, when you want to follow you just lose the downforce so it makes it harder. I think with a little more luck we could finish higher."
Asked about his qualifying dilemma, he said: "I think it's just amount of detail. I have become a little bit more sensitive to the car in the last few races, especially on a Saturday, on low fuel, something that I'm going to be working on from tomorrow in the simulator with the team.
"We have some ideas, but we operate in such a small window of detail that... I mean, you know, just that we need a strong Saturday and the positive thing is the pace is there on Sundays where the points are given but we have to sort out and have a clean weekend because the pace is there."
Check out our Sunday gallery from Silverstone here.