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Sergio Perez believes Red Bull Racing will be crippled by reliability issues at some point this season. The Mexican believes they were lucky to complete both the Bahrain GP and Saudi Arabian GP without any trouble.
Asked by Sportskeeda how concerned he was about the gearbox issue, Perez said:
“Well, reliability is where it is. We saw it today with Aston Martin. It's going to hit us at some point but obviously we need to keep working on that, we need to have the issue races whenever we can. We were in a lucky position in Bahrain but otherwise if we had to push to the end, we probably wouldn't make the race so there are a lot of reliability concerns at the moment but hopefully they don't hit us anytime soon.”
Commenting on the reliability issue he suffered from in qualifying, his teammate Max Verstappen said:
“Yeah, we have to do better. Absolutely. But also just have a cleaner weekend. I think that would be nice as well.”
Citing Aston Martin’s example where Lance Stroll retired from the race, Perez believes it is only a matter of time before reliability concerns start to show up on Red Bull's car too.
With Verstappen having suffered from a broken driveshaft causing a shock Q2 elimination in qualifying, Red Bull were worried about their cars completing the Jeddah race without any issues. As he tried to close in on Perez in the last ten laps of the Saudi Arabian GP, the Dutchman complained of suffering vibrations in his car.
Max Verstappen reveals he could not catch Sergio Perez due to concerns about his car
Max Verstappen revealed he had to back off while trying to chase Sergio Perez in the final stages of the race.
Verstappen admitted that he felt vibrations on the driveshaft and at the rear of his car, similar to what he experienced in qualifying before the driveshaft broke. Despite having the pace to chase a win, the Dutchman believes it was important to finish the race without an issue and settle for a second-place finish.
Explaining why it was difficult to close the gap to Sergio Perez, Verstappen said:
“So, once I got into P2, it was quite a decent gap, let's say like that, on a track where there's not a lot of deg. So I tried to, of course, close the gap [to Sergio Perez] a bit. But then, at one point, I picked up again, these vibrations on the driveshaft, on the rear. The team couldn't see anything, but I'm fairly sure there was something odd going on with the balance since the vibration started to kick in.”
He added:
“So, at one point, I did the calculations, and I wouldn't have been able to close that gap to the end with only 10 laps left. So, at one point, it's, I think, more important to just settle for second: not having an issue with the car.”
On whether it was similar to what he experienced in qualifying, the two-time reigning world champion said:
“Yeah, but of course, then yesterday in qualifying it just went. It snapped. Today, luckily, didn't do that but it started to have a similar effect on the feeling of driving and what you could hear.”
Due to the lack of preseason testing prior to the commencement of the 2023 season, most teams have had limited time to understand their cars or test them for reliability. The first few races are expected to throw up a few early reliability niggles for many teams.
Following the Saudi Arabian GP, Max Verstappen leads Sergio Perez in the drivers’ championship by a single point.
