21/04/2021
NEWS STORY
Helmut Marko admits his displeasure at Sergio Perez' Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, labelling the Mexican's performance as "a very bad day".
Having consistently given Alex Albon the benefit of the doubt throughout 2020, even when much of the media had already made up its mind, it might be perceived as ominous that Red Bull's Helmut Marko is already critical of Sergio Perez.
While the Austrian labelled Perez' debut for the team in Bahrain "sensational", he was pulling no punches after the Mexican's second outing.
Following a poor start, which saw him passed by Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc, Perez managed to re-pass the Ferrari driver before losing the position again after going off at Piratella.
Rejoining the track after the incident, he overtook Daniel Riccardo and Pierre Gasly behind the Safety Car, for which he received a 10s penalty.
Working his way back to fourth, he served his penalty at the first stop and rejoined in fifth, maintaining the position until red flag that followed the Bottas/Russell clash.
On lap 37 however, he made another unforced error at Tosa which saw him off and in the gravel, and by the time he got going again he was down in 14th.
"It started well in qualifying," Marko told Servus TV. "Suddenly, out of nowhere, he drives the second-best time. Then we thought that everything would fit.
"I think he didn't manage to get the tyres up to temperature right away like Max did," he added, in reference to the race.
"Of course, 11th place is more than annoying," he admitted.
"Above all, the spin at the restart cost him everything," said the Austrian. "Basically, it was a very bad day with a bad performance."