Why Sergio Perez's time for excuses at Red Bull is over

Sergio Perez

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Why Perez's time for excuses at Red Bull is over

Sergio Perez is the latest in a line of driver's to disappoint in Red Bull's second seat

Sam Hall

Wednesday 12 May 2021 08:02

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Sergio Perez was signed in an attempt to expel Red Bull's 'second-driver syndrome' and partner Max Verstappen in a bid to snatch the F1 constructors' title away from Mercedes.

But after four races with the team, the Mexican has so far failed to live up to his billing as the solution to Red Bull's problems.

When Perez crossed the line to win the Sakhir Grand Prix for Racing Point, there will have been only a handful of staunch Alex Albon supporters left believing the Thai-British driver had any hope of retaining his seat.

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Not only was Perez just a plucky underdog taking the fight to the perceived big boys, but he was now doing it AND winning.

How then, has the second dream move of the Mexican's career started in such a disappointing fashion? Is the second Red Bull seat cursed?

There may not be an actual curse but it certainly must feel like there is to those drivers unfortunate enough to have shared a garage with Verstappen.

For the purpose of this conversation, we are looking at team-mates who have joined Red Bull after the arrival of the Dutchman so Daniel Ricciardo will not feature. Here, Perez will be rated against Albon and Pierre Gasly.

Qualifying struggles

If Red Bull is to mount a serious challenge for the constructors' title, it needs to have a driver alongside Verstappen that is capable of qualifying well.

With both Albon and Gasly, this had been a major weakness of the team, with the former the worst offender. In his 26 races with the team, Albon recorded an average starting position of 7.6.

Things were not much better for Gasly in his short-lived Red Bull career, with an average of seventh.

Despite receiving criticism for his qualifying efforts in Spain and Bahrain, Perez was able to unlock the RB16B's pace at Imola when setting the second-fastest time and beating Verstappen.

With an average starting position of 5.5, Perez has not failed to make a mark but has left Red Bull hoping for more.

In the interests of fairness, in the opening four races of their time with Red Bull, Gasly qualified in an average position of 10.5 and Albon 12.3 although engine penalties played a part in the statistic for the latter.

All drivers, though, are ultimately measured against the stopwatch and, removing any instances where penalties skewed the data, Perez again returns a favourable result compared to his predecessors by qualifying an average of 0.339secs behind Verstappen.

Albon is second-best in trailing by 0.407s with Gasly third with a 0.438s deficit.