A really tough home game for Sergio Perez and his fans in Mexico: while the Red Bull driver is knocked out in Q1, his father dreams of winning the world title
It should have been the next Fiesta Mexicana, but after Q1 on Saturday there were long faces in the packed grandstands of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez: local hero Sergio Perez was out in the first qualifying session, and in 18th place on the grid, his hopes of a long-awaited home victory were also dashed!
“I had quite a few problems with the brakes. Whenever I tried to brake, I just got too much energy through the tires, which then makes it very difficult to stop the car,” said Perez after qualifying, explaining the reason for his disappointing performance.
However, the problems are not new for the Mexican. “It’s been like this for the last three races: I can’t stop the car. I’ve had to adjust my braking quite a bit, and we can see it in the data, but we can’t fix it at the moment,” explains Perez.
Papa Perez says: “Checo will be world champion”
Red Bull motorsport consultant Helmut Marko does not want to say anything about this directly after qualifying. The Austrian says on ORF: “We have to investigate this, and that it was so massive just now in qualifying, I don’t know why.” Marko says that Perez had also had to struggle with braking problems before that, but “not in the blatant way he has described it now”.
The qualifying setback is a bitter blow for the Mexican, whose ambitions remain as high as ever. In the run-up to the weekend, his father Antonio Perez, a local politician from Guadalajara, had said in an interview: “The best of Checo Perez is yet to come. I am sure that in time he will have the weapons and tools to fight for the World Cup. I will be very excited and I can say that Checo will be world champion.”
Asked by Sky about these statements, Marko explains: “Well, I honor the father’s optimism,” says the Red Bull consultant, “but unfortunately the hoped-for upswing that we all expected has not materialized.” With an eye to Sunday, the chances from the penultimate row of the grid are of course not exactly rosy, and Perez himself is aware of this:
“It’s going to be tough, because it’s also present in the long runs,” explains the Red Bull driver with regard to his braking problems, and specifies: “It’s especially at the end of the straights that I can’t stop the car. I just slide too much, and with the sensitive surface here, it makes it even worse,” says the 34-year-old.
But giving up is not an option for Perez in front of his home crowd: “I’ll give it my all. I’ll try to see with the team what solutions we can find. It’s obviously very disappointing. If there’s a Grand Prix where I want to do well, it’s here. Unfortunately, this event has been really tricky and difficult so far.”