Sergio Perez reckons it takes two to tangle after the F1 Abu Dhabi GP clash with Lando Norris, as he remains in disagreement.
It wasn’t the end that Red Bull’s Perez was hoping for in F1 Abu Dhabi GP. A penalty resulted in radio frustration and subsequent warning from the stewards after he apologised for his comments which was taken as personal insults by the FIA.
Aside the radio rant, Perez was still not in agreement with the penalty he was handed for his collision with McLaren’s Norris at Turn 6. The moment was certainly clumsy where the Brit stated that he was actually giving him way considering the pace difference.
But Perez still came close and they touched. The Brit took evasive action and went on the run-off to keep the place until the Mexican came back to re-pass him. The Red Bull thought it was 50-50 and that the McLaren driver at that moment retained the place still.
“To be totally honest, I think we ended up contacting which was unfortunate, but to make contact, you require both parts and Lando also had some responsibility in that because he turned into me as if there was no one there,” said Perez to media. “We ended up making contact tyre to tyre, as I was fully alongside him.
“He cut the corner, he gained time and I still had the penalty, so I honestly don’t agree with the decision but there’s nothing you can do. He didn’t lose anything, if anything he gained but when you touch each other, as I said to have that sort of contact, you require both cars to do that. In my opinion it was 50-50.
“Hard to understand why I got the penalty if I am totally honest. I am just happy with the performance we put,” summed up Perez, where he finished second on the road but dropped back to fourth – although he finished ahead of Norris.
The Brit said they simply lacked pace to fight the likes of Ferrari and Mercedes especially once they got ahead of him. If Norris was ahead of them, he could have managed to hold position as the pace was similar all around but not enough to pass each other.
“He was ahead,” said Norris to media. “I’m trying to let him past. I was on the right, I tried to let him past, I was four car lengths away from the apex and somehow he still crashed into me. So, impressive. I don’t know, I literally tried to let him past and somehow he crashed into me and got a penalty.
“It was tough overall. It wasn’t like the Ferrari and the Mercedes cleared off. If I’d stayed ahead of the Mercedes in the pit stop could I have just stayed ahead of him because of dirty air and things? Potentially. Regarding fight with George, when he caught cars, it always just benefited him.
“Sometimes I caught them at the end of the straights and then had to spend the whole lap behind them. So just a little bit unlucky at times. But George did a good job, Mercedes did a good job, so I’m not taking anything away from them. I think we just didn’t have the pace we wanted and to match their pace I had to push too hard and then I degraded like I did on the medium, like I did on both sets of hard tyres. So pace was probably the main thing that we lacked.”
Here’s the incident: https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/video.2023-abu-dhabi-grand-prix-perez-picks-up-penalty-for-contact-with-norris.1783638695201343621.html
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