Red Bull held a meeting after the Belgian GP to decide on Sergio Perez’s future, and despite no official announcement coming out, reports claimed that the Mexican would continue with the Milton-Keynes-based team. However, there was more to it, as Red Bull also agreed to change its behavior towards Perez.
Journalist Jonathan Noble, according to Motorsport, revealed,
“It is understood that one of the outcomes of the discussions between Horner and Marko was that if Red Bull could find ways to give Perez more of what he needed from his car, then that was a better route to delivering results than throwing someone new in.”
10 races to go, Red Bull has apparently committed to Perez for the season
Where do they finish in the constructors realistically? pic.twitter.com/HgkBsJiVjT
— Clapped (@F1Clapped) July 30, 2024
Perez had a decent start to the 2024 season. But his performances started taking a turn for the worse as the campaign progressed. Still, Red Bull offered him a two-year contract extension, which was met with widespread criticism.
Perez’s teammate Max Verstappen, however, always felt that the problem did not lie with Perez but with Red Bull’s car.
The Austrian stable realizes that now, and will help Perez get more up to speed with his car.
However, the 34-year-old can consider himself lucky, because had external parties not gotten involved, he could have been replaced by RB’s Daniel Ricciardo.
Ricciardo’s Red Bull Chances Taken Away by Liberty Media
After the Belgian GP, it was widely reported that Ricciardo would replace Perez before the next race weekend in Zandvoort. However, Liberty Media intervened to stop it from happening.
The Mexican driver is a huge asset to F1, commercially, because of his popularity in Latin America. Plus, the Mexican GP is coming up, so Perez not being a part of the paddock then could have resulted in major losses in terms of ticket sales.
Plus, Marko believed that Ricciardo wouldn’t fit Red Bull’s philosophy of promoting young talents from RB. As such, things would remain the way they were before the summer break.
