'Naughty' Sergio Perez praised by former 2x champion for his 'dirty' work at Red Bull

Mika Hakkinen recently spoke about Sergio Perez and how he has consistently done all the 'dirty' work for Red Bull. Over the last few seasons, Checo has helped the Austrian-British team in every way he can, so much so that he's considered a 'naughty' driver by the two-time world champion.

In a Unibet International YouTube video, Hakkinen explained how Perez looks like a naughty driver simply because he has been obedient and followed most team orders, even though some of them made him look bad. However, the former F1 driver praised Perez for what he does for the team. The Flying Finn said:

"Perez is a good teammate. He's allowed to be the naughty one. He seems to be very obedient. What I mean by being naughty is - that sometimes the team asks him to do things, such as slowing other down. Sergio does not care. He will slow them down, if the team wants. Whether it's the quali or the race, he will do what he is asked to do. I think it's dirty, but if it works, it works. It's a a question of one's image, though."

Of course, one of the most prominent examples of Sergio Perez employing dirty tactics is him defending other drivers for Max Verstappen to catch up and take the lead.

He has also diligently switched positions with his teammate when asked to. Continuing his take on the Mexican, Hakkinen said that all these strategies work well for the team, so they do not affect the driver. However, the former F1 driver did mention that it might tarnish Checo's reputation a bit.

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Sergio Perez reveals Red Bull's 'main priority' in 2023 F1 pre-season testing

With Red Bull's RB19 looking faultless in terms of performance, Sergio Perez explained how the team is mainly focusing on making it as reliable as possible. That's to ensure that the car does not break down during the season as the Austrian-British team plans to dominate the field once again. He said:

"I was happy to be back behind the wheel of the RB19 this morning. We mainly focussed on the long run, to make sure the car was reliable, and that was the main priority. The car feels good; we have a good pace, and hopefully, we can get some good fine tuning in on Saturday."

Sergio Perez did several race and qualifying simulation runs during pre-season testing to see how the car would run during actual race weekends. He reported that the RB19 is quite similar to last year's car but has some positive differences, mainly due to the slightly different tyres.