Sergio Perez says an engine problem caused his early elimination from qualifying for the Singapore Grand Prix.
The Red Bull driver qualified 13th as he and team mate Max Verstappen both failed to make the cut for Q3 in a shock off-day for the world champions.Perez said the team don’t understand what went wrong with their cars in qualifying. “Not at the moment. We have some ideas of what’s going on, but nothing straight away.”
Perez ended the session two tenths of a second away from reaching Q3 after he failed to improve on his final lap when he spun at turn three. Afterwards he said he encountered a problem with his power unit during that run.
“I’m really disappointed because we haven’t been able to make any progress. The fact that I had an issue with the engine on my final attempt for Q3 meant that I couldn’t make it into Q3, unfortunately.”
He described the balance problems he suffered throughout the weekend so far. “Every corner is quite different, we were playing around with the tools quite a lot.”
On a tight and twisty track like Singapore, Perez doesn’t expect Red Bull to make their usual progress through the pack. “I think the race pace was very strong on Friday, but given where we’re starting it’s going to be difficult,” he said.
“But hopefully it’s just a one-off and we can move on from here.”
Team principal Christian Horner confirmed the team removed some of the updates it brought for this race weekend ahead of qualifying. “We tried a new aero part in practice, but what we went into qualifying with is tried and tested,” he said. “For whatever reason, the car just hasn’t responded at this circuit.
“There is a lot to do but we won’t give up on anything. Starting outside of the top 10 at a track that is notoriously hard to overtake on is going to be tough but we certainly haven’t written this weekend off.”
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
2023 Singapore Grand Prix
- Sainz’s Singapore win made Leclerc focus on improving his race pace – Clear
- Singapore and Austin retirements cost me top 10 championship place – Ocon
- How Ocon’s “extreme” height for an F1 driver is helping other tall racers
- Steward’s admission Verstappen should have had penalty frustrates his rivals
- Drivers back Singapore qualifying tweak as rule changes again for Japanese GP
Coventry Climax
16th September 2023, 18:52
Shares his media trainer with Lance?
“But hopefully it’s just a one-off and we can move on from here.”
How many times though, have you said something rather similar already, this season?
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
17th September 2023, 5:12
Well, this time at least he wasn’t the problem (despite the spin), the 1-lap pace wasn’t there.
floodo1 (@floodo1)
16th September 2023, 19:04
Okaaay dude
Darryn Smith (@darryn)
16th September 2023, 19:20
So is this the recent rule change on the flexible wings or just a one off bad track for Red Bull?
MacLeod (@macleod)
16th September 2023, 21:25
Sounds more like a gear problem (the electronic part)
Yellow Baron
16th September 2023, 23:57
Oh great, more room for the conspiracy of helping max get out Q2. How convenient
LEcarrera4S
17th September 2023, 3:04
I think the same thing.
cdfemke (@cdfemke)
17th September 2023, 1:14
Weird that max and perez camt get theor stories straight and the same
SteveP
17th September 2023, 8:41
To paraphrase Perez – “it’s the car”
To paraphrase Max – “it’s the car”
Which I think a lot of people have been saying, for over a year. :)