Sergio Perez hit the wall and missed the first cut in qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix in his latest Saturday epic fail, the latest in a miserable spell for the Red Bull driver.
The Mexican driver spun at turn 8 at the Hungaroring, spinning into the barriers and losing the rear wing of the car as the red flags came out to allow the marshals to retrieve the stricken RB20.
Perez ended up classified in 16th place, and may be forced to drop to the back of the grid or even to pit lane depending on the work the team has to do getting "a lot of damage" repaired in time for Sunday's race.
“I lost it," he reported once he arrived back in the paddock. "I think I clipped the kerb. At that point, it was raining harder at turn 8 so it was quite late in the corner and it just sent me off completely in the wall.
"It was quite an impact," Perez admitted. "Luckily all good. A bit of pain on the leg but other than that all good, ready for the race.
“It’s something that was so hard to judge the conditions, it was raining harder but at the end you were not losing grip,” he explained. “I was improving my lap, so in hindsight when you look at it we were safe.
"We didn’t need to do that lap, but you also know a lot afterwards," he said. "These conditions can catch out anyone out there, but unfortunately it has been me two in a row."
“It’s good that he’s okay because it was quite a big accident,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner told F1 TV. "It’s a huge shame, yesterday was looking quite strong for him.
“Obviously it’s tricky conditions, but it’s the same for everybody. He was up on his lap time and I think he could see, probably, the rain on his visor and the car just got away from him."
It's the last thing that Perez needed, with the spotlight on him and suggestions that Red Bull are considering dropping him from the line-up over the summer despite having just signed a new two year contract extension.
“It hurts. It hurts to let your whole team down, but at the end of the day I’m determined even more than ever to get back up to where we belong as a team.
“It hurts that it happened again, especially in the run that I am going through." But the Mexican insisted that he would bounce back from the recent slump and prove himself to still be the best driver for the team.
"I’m determined to turn things around," he stated. "It’s quite hard to face all the media after all these difficult moments, but I think when we get back to it it will be even sweeter.
"Nothing changes, I’m not worried," he said. “I’m fully determined to turn my season around and to focus on my performance. We just need a clean weekend, clean conditions, not this variability. Just get the most out of it, that’s the main thing.
“The feeling with the car is improving, the understanding with it as well, so we're definitely making progress,” he argued. "Yesterday was probably the best Friday of the season
"We had a really good day, a very promising day," he pointed out. "So there is light at the end of the tunnel. We just have to come through it and hopefully tomorrow can be the day.
“Tomorrow is another opportunity. We’re starting [16th] so let’s see what we are able to do from there," he said. “There’s a long race ahead of us. I think I just have to push out the external noise down, focus on the job.
"We had very good information on the long runs so hopefully we can have some really good pace to come through the field and hopefully score some points."
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