Sergio Perez, Racing Point, Interlagos, 2019

We didn’t deserve points in Brazil – Perez

2019 Brazilian Grand Prix

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Sergio Perez said Racing Point didn’t deserve to score their two points for ninth place after an uncompetitive showing in the Brazilian Grand Prix.

He qualifying 15th and finished ninth but complained of poor straight-line speed in his RP19. Team mate Lance Stroll retired from 14th place after collecting debris from the collision between the two Ferrari drivers.

That incident promoted Perez into the points and he gained another place on the penultimate lap when Alexander Albon was knocked into a spin by Lewis Hamilton.

“We have no speed at all on the straight line,” Perez told his race engineer after crossing the finishing line. The Racing Points were 17th and 18th through the speed trap in the race, almost 20kph slower than Daniil Kvyat, who recorded a peak of 341.2kph.

Afterwards Perez admitted the team had been too slow. “It was a chaotic race,” he said. “We needed to be strong out there.

“We were not good enough. We were lacking so much straight-line speed today. We couldn’t fight, we got overtaken very easily and then we couldn’t push to get past people.

“So [it was] quite a disappointing race. Two points that we don’t really deserve because we didn’t have the pace all weekend.”

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9 comments on “We didn’t deserve points in Brazil – Perez”

  1. Sergio Perez said Racing Point didn’t deserve to score their two points for second place after an uncompetitive showing in the Brazilian Grand Prix.

    Ninth.

    1. Lol, I was also wondering how many cars got penalties to hand a podium to a pink panther!

  2. The Racing Points were 17th and 18th through the speed trap in the race, almost 20kph slower than Daniil Kvyat, who recorded a peak of 341.2kph.

    On the few occasions I had studied speed trap data it looked like the winner of the race doesn’t usually have the fastest speed trap measurement, so I’m not sure if you can regard Kvyat’s faster speed trap measurement as an accurate indicator of superior performance.

    1. I’d definitely agree with that, considering the other Toro Rosso outdragged a Mercedes…

      1. I am just starting to think that in terms of straight line speed from he engine, it goes in this order:

        Ferrari
        Honda
        Mercedes
        Renault

        I think Red Bull are often not as quick as mercedes simply because of their aerodynamics. They seem to have more downforce and have more grip in the corners I’d say. That Honda though – in the Toro Rosso, it looked very quick. Though hamilton did have damage.

        1. @thegianthogweed I agree with your assessment. But, keep in mind that Mercedes always favor more downforce car design and setup since last few years, very likely because they have significant advantage on engine power in hybrid era so they can afford to do that. That advantage is greatly diminished now because Ferrari and maybe Honda has caught up. It’s interesting to see next year car design if they still go with maximum downforce or start compromising a bit to reduce drag. Ferrari top speed advantage already become problem in several races this year and Honda surprisingly lost less power in high altitude compared to Mercedes and Ferrari. Renault, though, I can’t see if they can catch up with the others. With McLaren get Mercedes engine for 2021, it seems Williams-Renault might be back.

    2. Gotta have straight line speed to get into a position to overtake though.

    3. @drycrust

      I agree about the speed not being representative of the car’s performance. I remember one time (i think it was Malaysia 2015) that Maldonaldo constantly kept getting by far the fastest straight line speed. But there was no way that was even close to the best car that year. Similar with Willimas in 2014. On the straight, they were very often easily the fastest, but they were dreadful at tracks like Monaco despite this.

      Even a massive straight line speed advantage doesn’t always make the car better than others overall.

  3. This was the one and only race this year I think Stroll looked to outperform Perez, weithout relying on Peres making a mistake. Stroll instantly got ahead and those positions only changed as the stops were being made. Once they hade both stopped the same numebr of times, Stroll was back ahaed by 2 positions. It was only after the safety car restart that Perez managed to get by, then Stroll’s suspension failed. He deserves some credit for his race this time. He simply did look quicker than Perez all race even if the car wasn’t great.

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