The 2023 F1 season began with the promise of an exciting title bout between Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez. However, a dip in the Mexican’s performance since the Miami GP has seen all such hopes die. During the recent episode of the Sky Sports F1 podcast, David Croft and Karun Chandhok discussed the potential moment where Verstappen “broke” Perez.
Since the Miami GP, Sergio Perez has struggled to find consistent performance, while Verstappen has been winning by long and comfortable margins. After qualifying in P6 courtesy of a penalty in Spa last weekend, Verstappen overtook everyone to win the race by over 22 seconds. Meanwhile, Perez, who qualified in second place, finished where he started.
The 33-year-old has shown significant improvement in performance, but his teammate’s ruthless dominance has cast a dark cloud over him. Verstappen put on a 22-second lead on the Mexican driver in 27 laps, showing how different both drivers have been this season.
Sergio Perez “broken” by his teammate, claim experts
During the Sky Sports F1 podcast including David Croft and Karun Chandhok, the topic of Sergio Perez being “broken” by ‘Mad Max’ surfaced. Chandhok introduced the issue by comparing Red Bull breaking two trophies in two weeks with their younger driver “breaking” the older one. The exact moment, as pointed out by Chandhok, came when Verstappen overtook Perez during the Miami GP.
“Ever since he got overtaken on whatever it was, lap 41 in Miami, it’s just gone away from him.”
David Croft also pitched his opinion, agreeing with Helmut Marko’s words. Croft claims Perez’s troubles began when he thought he could become the world champion. When the Miami GP started, Perez was only 6 points behind Verstappen, and per Croft, “that broke him a little bit,” and the crash in Q1 in Monaco “absolutely broke Checo.”
Verstappen’s dominance causing problems for Perez
Courtesy of a five-place grid penalty, Verstappen started the race from P6 in Belgium. His teammate, Sergio Perez, qualified P2 as a result, behind Charles Leclerc. But that did not matter much once the race began as Verstappen quickly overtook all the drivers and took a commanding lead over them. It took him 27 laps to put up a 22-second lead on the Mexican, who finished in the same spot he started the race in.
This has also raised questions about Perez’s inability to perform as well as Verstappen, despite having the same car. Rumors about him potentially being swapped with Daniel Ricciardo started surfacing, but those rumors have been put to rest for the time being.
While he has been struggling at times, Perez has still done the bare minimum Red Bull expects from him. Team Principal Christian Horner is happy with the 33-year-old’s performance and has clarified that he shall remain a part of the Red Bull driving lineup until the end of his contract.
