Sergio Perez says he was left “super frustrated” by the accident with Carlos Sainz that took both men out of the Azerbaijan GP on the penultimate lap.
They were racing each other for third place in the slipstream of Charles Leclerc when they touched on the run out of Turn 2, which led to hard contact with the wall on the left.
The stewards looked into the incident and opted to take no further action on either driver after determining that neither was predominantly to blame.
“I’m super frustrated that we both ended up our weekends like that for our teams,” he said when asked by this writer about the incident.
“And it’s just a shame, because when we exited Turn 2, there was a metre between the cars, and then within a metre or two, we ended up making contact.
“Obviously I understand what Carlos was trying to do, to follow Charles’s tow, but I was there, and it all happened very quickly. As he was having more speed the way he moved meant that he touched my front right tyre quite quickly.”
He added: “Basically at the time, I just felt like he didn’t realise that I was there. And like I say, what disappoints me the more is that we exited Turn 2 with a metre between the cars, and we still within two metres end up making contact.
“It’s a shame, because Carlos is definitely the last guy I want to have an incident with. It’s just a shame that we both ruined our weekends.”
Perez was competitive all weekend in Baku, and might even have had a shot at victory had he not faced a sturdy defence from Lando Norris, who helped to give Oscar Piastri the advantage to stay ahead.
“I think lost two seconds with Lando holding me back, two and a half seconds,” he said. “And that really prevented me to do the undercut on Piastri.
“I think being on the dirty air with the low grip was not ideal. So I think I would have had a much better race, definitely. We had the pace for the win today.”
A good result would have been timely for the Mexican after what has been a disappointing season to date.
“Yeah, it’s a massive frustration,” he said. “It makes me feel super sad for my team, McLaren overtook us in the championship.
“But the positive thing is that the pace is back. I think with the upgrades we brought have brought us in contention, and that’s something we can be happy with.
“That’s definitely encouragement. But I’m aware that there’s still a lot of work to do, because when you see with Max, how much he struggled on the weekend, I think he probably was a touch or two out of the setup, and then it’s a huge difference in terms of weekend.
“So it keeps showing that the car is too sensitive. So we’ve got some work to do. I think we’ve done a good step, but we need another two steps like this.”
Adam Cooper F1 