Sergio Perez could lose his Red Bull seat this summer following a string of poor performances, with the Austrian team’s adviser Helmut Marko admitting an “evaluation” is planned. The Mexican signed a new two-year contract at Red Bull at the beginning of last month but has only accumulated 15 points in the last six races.
Perez has driven for Red Bull in F1 since 2021 after taking over Alex Albon’s seat but has only won five races for the team.
And he has been completely overshadowed by Max Verstappen, who has won the last three Drivers’ Championships.
Perez started the British Grand Prix from the pit lane at the weekend after spinning out in Q1 and went on to finish the race in 17th.
The 34-year-old failed to finish the Monaco and Canadian Grands Prix earlier this summer and has failed to clinch a podium finish in any of the previous seven races.
And discussing the superstar’s future at Red Bull, Marko told Grandprix 247: “All Formula 1 contracts have exit clauses, most of them related to performance – or let’s say for the top drivers. As I mentioned before, we will have an evaluation during the summer break, and then we will make a decision.”
Perez could have just two races to save his Red Bull career, with only the Hungarian Grand Prix and Belgian Grand Prix remaining before the summer break. And Perez has already been told by Red Bull chief Christian Horner that he needs to make vast improvements going forward.
“He knows it’s unsustainable to not be scoring points,” Horner explained as he spoke about Perez after the Silverstone race.
“We have to be scoring points in that car, and he knows that. He knows his role and his target. Nobody is more eager than Checo to get back and find his form again.”
And he added: “We took a gamble in the race. He started on the hard tyre, he was making decent progress early on in the race. The rain started to arrive, he was P15 or 16 at the time. You roll the dice a little at that point as Ferrari did with [Charles] Leclerc. He went onto the inter. If the rain had picked up, he’d have looked a hero. It didn’t. So you don’t.”
Perez, meanwhile, has already addressed his recent displays in the car but has insisted his attention is firmly focused on the next two races.
“I know where I am, in terms of contract and that sort of thing,” he stated. “I cannot let it be a distraction because I need to focus on the next two weekends – which are the priority – and work together with the team to get out of this difficult period.”