Red Bull’s Sergio Perez blamed a slow Esteban Ocon for compromising his final run in Sprint qualifying, finishing in a lacklustre eighth place for tomorrow’s Formula 1’s Austrian Grand Prix Sprint race.
The final eight-minute SQ3 session in Friday’s Sprint qualifying session at the Red Bull Ring saw all 10 competitors wait until the final few minutes before heading out onto the circuit.
That heaped pressure on the drivers to nail their out-laps and final push laps to set the strongest time possible, but Perez came unstuck in this regard.
The Mexican credited a run-in with Alpine’s Ocon with compromising his efforts.
“I think we were in the mix today,” said Perez (via Sky Sports F1).
“Unfortunately, I don’t know what Esteban was doing there.
“He apparently had to drive really slowly and I did my final lap within half a second from him.
“Basically, there was no chance. It’s a shame because I think we’re having a more promising pace today. Unfortunately, we were not able to maximise it today.
“I think we should have been in the mix today, but for circumstances out of our control, we didn’t end up where we needed to be. I’m confident that tomorrow will be a better day.”
Perez might be starting out of position for Saturday morning’s Sprint in eighth, but there was no such trouble for his Red Bull team-mate Max Verstappen.
Verstappen topped all three Sprint qualifying sessions, beating McLaren’s Lando Norris to pole by just under a tenth of a second to deliver the best possible result for the Red Bull team.
With plenty of orange-clad Dutch fans in the crowd, Verstappen said in parc ferme following Sprint qualifying that it felt like “my home grand prix.”
Verstappen went on to say it was “Nice to drive the car, I think immediately the car was well balanced and then, of course, you make some little adjustments going into the Sprint quali and everything has been working really well.
“So yeah, good start to the weekend still of course a lot of things to do but I’m happy with today.”
The contrasting Formula 1 fortunes of Red Bull’s drivers continue to deliver in Verstappen’s favour.
Perez, meanwhile, will need to focus on recovering as many positions as possible in tomorrow’s Sprint and delivering a more rounded performance in Grand Prix qualifying.
