Perez on victory in Saudi Arabia: 'It was almost taken away from us again'

19 March 2023 at 18:52

GPblog.com

Sergio Perez recorded the fifth victory of his Formula 1 career in the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix. In the second half of the race, he was put under considerable pressure by teammate Max Verstappen, who had driven an impressive catch-up race from 15th on the grid. However, Perez also proved he could get the most out of the RB19 and managed to stay ahead of the reigning world champion.

At the start, Perez lost the lead to Fernando Alonso, but a few laps later he managed to regain the lead. For his part, Alonso had to serve a five-second time penalty for being out of position at the start. However, he managed to do so with minimal time loss by collecting the penalty during the safety car. Alonso has subsequently lost his P3 because the penalty was served incorrectly.

Perez wins in Jeddah

"It turned out to be tougher than expected. The safety car, we really did the job in the first stint trying to take the victory from us again in Jeddah," Perez said after the race. By this he is referring to last year's race, where he led the race but the safety car threw a spanner in the works just after he had made his pit stop.

"The team did a fantastic job. They worked so hard during the weekend," Perez continued. "We had a lot of mechanical issues but they have been on top of it. It's time to celebrate. The important thing today, is that we were the fastest car today. There is some work to do. We need to do some work to get better starts in the future."