F1 champion blasts 'OVERAGGRESSIVE' Sergio Perez - 'What were you doing?'

Pérez in aanloop naar race in Canada — Photo: © LAT Images

Sergio Perez

'What were you doing?' - F1 champion blasts 'OVERAGGRESSIVE' Perez

Sergio Perez nearly collided with Max Verstappen during Saturday's sprint race and Damon Hill was critical of his driving

Matthew Hobkinson Lead Editor

F1 Editor & Journalist

Saturday 1 July 2023 22:57

Damon Hill has labelled Sergio Perez's start to the sprint race as "overaggressive", after he narrowly avoided contact with Red Bull team-mate Max Verstappen.

A hectic start to Saturday's sprint race saw Perez take the lead heading into the first corner. But a poor exit out of turn one allowed Verstappen back in as the team-mates came very close to making contact in the opening stages.

Both Red Bull drivers took issue with the actions of their counterpart, with Verstappen taking to his team radio to say: "He pushed me off man what the f***?"

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Perez replied: "What's wrong with Max man?" on team radio.

Hill: Very feisty from Perez

{inlineimage[https://sportsbase.io/images/gpfans/copy_620x348/a6bb5f588cbdee1ce47ee635258cac091a908121.jpg][Sergio Perez got the better of Max Verstappen at the start of the sprint race][2]}

Hill: Very feisty from Perez

Sergio Perez got the better of Max Verstappen at the start of the sprint race

Yet Hill believes that it was the Mexican at fault for nearly taking both cars out of the race, as he labelled Perez's moves as "overaggressive".

“We want to see entertainment, they provided entertainment," he told Sky Sports. "If you’re a team boss, you might have a quiet word with Sergio and go ‘what were you doing?’, because you nearly had both of our cars nearly got swamped by everyone else as you both ran wide in turn three.

“That was a little bit too overaggressive, do you mind not doing that in the future? Maybe save the racing for a bit later down the track.

"But of course, what happened was that Max was 20 seconds down the road. So, I don’t know, it was very feisty from Sergio."