The future of Sergio Pérez at Red Bull hangs in the balance, at least if we are to believe the comments from the team management. Both Christian Horner and Helmut Marko have hinted that Checo could potentially be dismissed prematurely – perhaps even after the GP of São Paulo. However, Pérez denies all exit rumors and assures that he will still be racing in Formula 1 next year.
In the run-up to the race weekend in Brazil, Sergio Pérez was once again confronted with all the speculations about his future. Although he already has a contract for the next two years, Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson are openly vying for his seat. The Mexican driver acknowledges that he has had a disappointing year, but still assumes that he will be allowed to stay.”You’ll see me in Las Vegas and again next year,” a relaxed Sergio Pérez told Formula1.com. “I’m not worried about that at all.” Even when pointed to the endless criticism from advisor Helmut Marko, he remains calm. “I know I’ll be a Red Bull driver next year,” he continued. “I can’t say more than that.”
Promising Outlook
Sergio Pérez is now focusing on the upcoming weekend in São Paulo – he wants to put his disappointing home race in Mexico City behind him as quickly as possible. “What happened there is in the past,” he explained. “We just move on. I now understand what went wrong in the qualification – we have identified a number of problems and I think we are on the right track to solve them. That’s promising.” Pérez didn’t get past Q1 in the qualification in Mexico and finished the race in seventeenth place.
Meanwhile, Red Bull has slipped back to third place in the championship. Partly due to Pérez’s disappointing season, the Austrians are now fifty-four points behind McLaren. “When you look at the pace of McLaren and Ferrari, they really seem to be on a different level,” the Mexican sighed. “I hope we can compete again in Brazil. It’s a different circuit, so we’ll see.”
