Sergio Perez has firmly rejected suggestions he could find himself without a Formula 1 drive next year despite having extended his Red Bull contract in June.
His most recent contract extension should keep him at Red Bull until the end of 2026. However Perez’s performances since then have prompted constant speculation he could lose his place at the team.Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said in July Perez’s poor points-scoring was “unsustainable”, but told the team’s staff two races later he will remain their driver for next year.
Daniel Ricciardo, who Red Bull rehired and appointed to their second team RB to assess his potential as a replacement for Perez, was dropped after the last race in Singapore. His replacement Liam Lawson has now been tipped by some as a potential replacement for Perez.
However during the four-week gap since the last round Perez dispelled speculation about his future on social media. “Sometimes people just link these rumours and a lot of people pick it up, especially back in Mexico, with the Mexican Grand Prix coming up I didn’t want my fans to be misled into false information,” he explained.
“I just wanted to make it clear that I 100% will be here next year,” Perez told the official F1 channel. “I have my contract and I will fulfil it and that’s not in my mind. In my mind is to sort out the issues we have for the moment with the car.”
Lawson, who made his F1 debut last year, is the third driver to join the grid since the season started, along with Oliver Bearman and Franco Colapinto. Meanwhile Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Jack Doohan have also secured F1 drives for next year.
Perez said he is impressed by the quality of F1’s newest arrivals. “It’s great to see these new drivers coming in and being competitive straight away,” he said.
“These days, the drivers are arriving a lot more prepared than when I started. They’re being with Formula 1 teams for pretty much their entire career so they’ve been to a lot of F1 races, they know how it works and they’re really up to speed straight away. So it’s great to see them.”
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MacLeod (@macleod)
18th October 2024, 8:29
He stays in the car as long he perform otherwise contractwise that year could be short.
Nick T.
18th October 2024, 9:16
Unless he starts failing to reach Q2 again, he’s going absolutely nowhere. I find it funny that some media talk about RBR no longer being risk tolerant and ruthlessly cutting drivers / throwing new drivers into trial by fire. If Perez didn’t bring absolute truckloads of cash, they would have tried different drivers in the second RBR seat long ago. But that would cut short the hour long podcast where they discuss the second seat at RBR.
anon
18th October 2024, 11:09
Nick T., Perez’s position at the team may also be a case of Red Bull not really having an alternative to turn to.
Red Bull haven’t been shy about indicating Ricciardo was being considered as a potential alternative to Perez, but ultimately decided that his performances at their junior team did not warrant a promotion.
Until fairly recently, it seems that Red Bull had some concerns about whether Tsunoda would have been capable of making the jump to the parent team as well. Tsunoda himself has said in the Japanese press that, until earlier this year, he wasn’t pushing himself in his physical and mental training as hard as he could have and therefore hadn’t given Red Bull enough confidence that he was up to the job.
Outside of that, it seems most teams are not really willing to let their drivers go from their current contracts. Sainz was on the open market, but the somewhat acrimonious way he parted with Red Bull has probably scuppered any future chances with Red Bull, whilst most other drivers have already made their moves for next year and don’t seem to want to step into Perez’s place.
Nick T.
19th October 2024, 3:58
There were plenty of drivers they could have replaced Perez with and there still are. What’s happened is that they’ve boxed themselves into a corner due to their desire to find a driver who is good enough but not good enough to threaten Max’s security. It’s why they didn’t sign Alonso or Sainz. That had nothing to do with the acrimony of his departure or the dads’ beef. That would have been an issue for Sainz to swallow. Not Red Bull. Here are all drivers one could safely bet would do a better job:
1. Colapinto already appears to be better than Albon just 4 rounds into his career and the media were falling over themselves speculating on a possible return to RBR before he extended his contract with Williams.
2. Bottas
3. Yuki: he might be immature, but he’s clearly faster than Perez
4. Going by driver performance relative to car performance, Ricciardo has had a far better season than Perez and we know he likes the same type of extremely pointy setup as Max. RBR just couldn’t publicly justify promoting w/Yuki having the advantage.
5. Basically anyone. IMO, Perez is mentally crushed and I genuinely believe anyone from Magnussen to any of the top 6-7 F2 drivers could do a better job.
joe jopling (@jop452)
18th October 2024, 18:47
When I hear someone saying he will be there next year, I feel he is trying to strengthen his claim for compo when they release him, as they surely will
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
18th October 2024, 18:48
Actually that happened many times in recent years.
Jere (@jerejj)
18th October 2024, 9:20
He’ll most likely get to honor his contract, given Ricciardo’s failure to show he’d be an improvement on him, Red Bull’s clear reluctance to promote Tsunoda, & Lawson’s inexperience, so he’s most likely safe in any case, albeit contract termination could still happen after the season if his performance level is excessively subpar.
Simon
18th October 2024, 22:37
Word salad. As usual
Task = write a piece of 500 words. Occy ignores this, writes 1000 words anyway…
Nick T.
19th October 2024, 4:00
You’re, in all seriousness, mentally unbalanced. Simon says “seek help.”
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
18th October 2024, 9:53
Insert doubt meme
Yes (@come-on-kubica)
18th October 2024, 9:54
He’d had a woeful season, possibly the worst driver on the grid relative to the car. He’s had one good race and still managed to bottle. Much like 3 or 4 others on the grid just needs to be dropped and some new talent in those seats.
Coventry Climax
18th October 2024, 10:58
Notice how and where he switches from “I” to “we”? With ‘we’ as in: ‘I’m not to blame’?
Yet as the results for Red Bull over the seasons clearly show, the only issue with the car is actually the one trying to set it up and race it.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
18th October 2024, 12:54
Very good point, I didn’t notice until you pointed it out, but I’m aware perez always does like this: when it’s a good result, it’s “I”, and when it’s a bad performance it’s “we”.
S
18th October 2024, 13:28
That’s probably because his engineering team is responsible for the car, while ‘he’ just has a contract to drive it.
If the car doesn’t do what he wants and needs it to, it goes back to who is designing the car and translating the telemetry and data into a setup.
Hint – that isn’t the driver.
Both ‘I’ and ‘we’ are used correctly in the given context.
MichaelN
18th October 2024, 15:02
That’s not really fair, Pérez had a very solid start to the season. Not as fast as Verstappen to be sure, but on the podium. Then “something” changed and while Verstappen was still okay (helped by an underperforming McLaren) Pérez had a set of woeful races.
Coventry Climax
18th October 2024, 18:23
There’s noting unfair about it. We’re not talking just one season here. He’s been very weak generally, but always comes up with excuses why it isn’t his fault.
There’s sparse moments where he is fast, but that’s not what being a good -let alone great- driver is all about, and these moments most certainly don’t make up for the poor performances otherwise.
He makes very, very silly and immature choices, usually when he get’s frustrated from not being able to pass, like he’s never grown out of rookie status.
Whenever he does manage to qualify around the first places, he messes up and has to do one of his signature recovery races, which people hail him for, but forget he should never have been in that position to start with.
This season I don’t think he’s gained one single place at the start of the race, (could be wrong by one or two places: Didn’t count them, but do notice) and on average has lost, well, how many?
My opinion: He’s a lousy driver and has no place being in one of the top teams, just bringing them down instead of up.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
18th October 2024, 18:50
This is also true, but it’s become a pattern by now: he starts decently, let’s say at his own peak as a driver, then by mid season he’s terrible and continues like that till he improves a bit again in the last few races, it’s happened last year too and 2022 also wasn’t a great season.
Retired (@jeff1s)
18th October 2024, 12:20
France Colapinto wants you to proofread before posting ;)
Adrian Hancox (@ahxshades)
18th October 2024, 13:33
So – he’s still announcing his retirement in Mexico then :)