When Sergio Perez finished his last fast lap four minutes before the end of Q2 in Las Vegas, it dawned on him: “We’re stopping pretty early, aren’t we?” He was still in fifth place, but it was predictable that some of his direct competitors would improve.
Although Perez’s race engineer explained on the radio that they were driving exactly “as discussed”, Perez apparently did not realize beforehand that he would be called in so early. At least not “to that extent”.
Ultimately, he also admits: “We didn’t have the last tenth of pace today. Las Vegas is a new track for us, so I expected something like that a bit. It is what it is.”
The Red Bull driver was passed on to twelfth place and was therefore not allowed to take part in Q3. His team apparently hadn’t expected that the track would build up so much grip at the end of Q2. That was foreseeable, after all there are no support races in Las Vegas. This increases the so-called “track evolution”.
Red Bull “optimistic for the race”
“We thought this was the best program,” he says, referring to the fact that some engineers had expected that there could be a lot of traffic at the end of the qualifying segments in the fight for the best positions on the track.
“In hindsight, it’s easy to say that that was the wrong decision. We were a bit lucky to get through in Q1 because we had to stop on the last lap. And then we stopped a bit too early in Q2. After that, the track got even worse “better – and we were already in the pits,” he sighs.
In addition, unlike his teammate Max Verstappen, Perez “did not make the modifications that Max did” after Thursday’s training, explains Red Bull motorsport consultant Helmut Marko in an interview with “Sky”. “You saw that at top speed. But still: We are optimistic for the race.”
Perez nods: “I think there could be a lot of tire wear in the race. There are a few things to pay attention to and I think my pace in the race should be a lot better than in qualifying. Hopefully that will give us a good one tomorrow Piece forward.”