Perez doubts that a P2 in the championship will change his mindset

Sergio Perez has been struggling for several Grand Prix races. The Mexican driver has only won two Grand Prix races this season, with his last victory in Baku. During several weekends, Checo has had difficulties in qualifying, sometimes being eliminated as early as Q2 or even Q1. Despite Max Verstappen’s domination in the RB19, Perez seemed lost at times. Hamilton even came close to taking advantage of this in the driver’s standings, before being eliminated from the Austin Grand Prix, leaving him 39 points behind the Mexican.

Even if the results were disappointing, Christian Horner had stated that his position at Red Bull in 2024 did not depend on a P2 in the driver standings. “There is no such clause,” he had declared to AutoSport. Perez will keep his seat for the 2024 season.

Reduce the gap in running.

Currently, Perez is in his best position in his career at the World Championship. He is in second place, far behind Max Verstappen. However, despite this unprecedented performance in his career, the former Racing Point driver does not believe that this status as vice-world champion will be what mentally relaunches him. “I will tell you once I have obtained this second place trophy if this distinction relaunches me, but I don’t think it will make a difference,” explained the 33-year-old athlete. “If there is a difference, it will be in the way I achieve it. I want to achieve it with more victories this year, finishing the season strong and having a good momentum to approach the winter still believing that I can be champion in the future, which is the ultimate goal.”

During the press conference, Checo Perez explained that the performance gap between him and Verstappen could not continue. He asserts that he is still not ready to give up and is determined to return to the fight. “We cannot have this kind of gap,” he conceded. “We need to go back to the first six races or so when we were battling with Max, and I think that’s a goal, to regain that level of comfort with the car. It’s difficult, of course. It’s not ideal when going through a tough period in your career, but I simply love the challenge of getting back to that level. The easiest thing would be to give up everything, but that’s not me, that’s not who I am, and I’m not going to give up.”

At home, Checo Perez will start from the 3rd row, alongside Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes.