Red Bull boss Christian Horner feels Sergio Perez drove his best-ever race in Jeddah on Sunday

Christian Horner praised Sergio Perez and claimed that the 2023 F1 Saudi Arabian GP was his best race ever. Even after experiencing some reliability issues, the Mexican driver won the race. Furthermore, he even managed to keep a consistent five-second gap from his teammate Max Verstappen, not allowing him to take the lead in the race.

Speaking to Sky Sports F1, Horner praised both Red Bull drivers for keeping it clean and bringing home the maximum number of points for the team. He further praised Sergio Perez for having a brilliant race weekend. He mentioned how Checo was able to perform exceptionally well on hard tires, building a five-second gap to Verstappen. The Red Bull team boss stated:

"We've got a great car and two great drivers, we talked about it earlier in a briefing that you are free to race, but keep it clean. Both of them are so competitive, but I think today for Checo, that was his best Grand Prix, particularly after the restart on the hard tire. He immediately built a five-second gap and then he maintained that and managed it, so, all credit to him and the team for getting maximum points."

Prior to this, Christian Horner recalled how Red Bull managed their race. He mentioned how Verstappen was lucky with the safety car timing, giving him an opportunity to pass both the Ferraris with ease. He was generally happy with the team's result, further adding:

"We got a little lucky with the timing on the Safety Car (deployed on Lap 18), which enabled Max to jump both the Ferraris and that worked out well for him. What we saw today was the pace of our car on this circuit - and I said it is going to take two or three venues to get a really clear - but that was everything we had today."

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Sergio Perez concerned about Red Bull's reliability woes

Although Red Bull grabbed the 1-2 podium finish in the 2023 F1 Saudi Arabian GP, it wasn't an easy task for the team. Both Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen faced different kinds of reliability issues during the race. The Mexican mentioned how these issues with the car could soon start costing Red Bull if they weren't careful.

When Sportskeeda asked the driver how concerning the gearbox issue could be for the team, Sergio Perez stated:

“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.”

As of now, it seems like the only thing that could stop Red Bull from dominating in the 2023 F1 season is reliability issues.