Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has asserted that Sergio Perez’s recent struggles are “psychological” as he slumped to a Q1 exit for Formula 1’s Canadian Grand Prix.
Perez entered the weekend having renewed his deal with the team, but the boost failed to deliver an upturn as he was dumped out in Q1 at the second straight round.
The Mexican struggled throughout the opening segment and his last attempt was not enough to prevent Alex Albon’s Williams from demoting him down to 16th spot.
Perez has been absent in Q3 at the last three events and his alarming troubles to extract pace from the RB20 have drawn comparisons to a similar collapse last term.
However, Marko has pointed to Max Verstappen’s exploits to match George Russell’s pole time to the thousandth as evidence that Perez’s issues are his own making.
“It’s not the car, you can see that with Max. I think it’s more psychological,” Marko told ServusTV.
“It was close, and when the conditions change, he finds it much more difficult. But the fact that it’s already the third time (not in Q3) is painful.”
Perez lamented having no rear grip on his Red Bull compared to the earlier final practice hour where he classified ninth, four-tenths down on team-mate Verstappen.
“It was a total disaster,” Perez admitted. “I just couldn’t get the grip in. Mainly the issue was the rear end, the rear axle. It felt a little bit worse.”
Perez has hinted that venturing back to the pits with five minutes remaining and being resigned to a sole lap to salvage his hopes compromised his tyre preparation.
“I think it was a very strange sensation for a lot of cars out there,” he pondered in reference to the unexpected Ferrari double elimination in Q2 that would materialise.
“For us, I just couldn’t get the tyre switched on. It was taking a while to really switch on the tyre.
“It was a total disaster. I think when we went at the end, I just couldn’t get a proper lap in.”
