Red Bull motorsport advisor Helmut Marko has rubbished reports that Liberty Media intervened and urged Red Bull Racing to retain Sergio Perez for commercial reasons.
The Mexican driver’s future in F1 was in jeopardy ahead of the sport’s summer break, with Red Bull mulling replacing the 34-year-old F1 veteran due to his lack of performance and results.
Perez is currently a whopping 146 points behind his Red Bull teammate and championship leader Max Verstappen, a significant deficit that is weighing on the Milton Keynes-based outfit’s battle in F1’s Constructors’ standings.
Although Red Bull still leads the teams’ championship, its advantage over second-placed outfit McLaren has fallen to 42 points.
Following Red Bull’s decision after the Belgian Grand Prix to keep its line-up unchanged, even despite another disappointing race by Perez at Spa-Francorchamps, it was reported that F1 chief executive Stefano Domenicali had called on Red Bull to retain Perez in order to protect ticket sales for next October’s Mexican Grand Prix.
But Marko quickly shot down the reports.
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"Reports that his continued commitment is due to Liberty Media's desire for him to race in Mexico are not true," said Marko, writing in his regular column for Speedweek.
"They certainly want him to race in his home race, but our choice of driver is not based on Liberty Media's intentions."
Although Marko acknowledged Perez’s performance shortfall and inconsistencies, the Austrian believes the beleaguered driver remains Red Bull’s best option for the second half of F1’s current season.
"Sergio will continue to drive the Red Bull Racing car after the summer break, as there are now races on tracks where he was good last year and we are counting on stability," he said.
"He has also shown good performances from time to time, and at the last race weekend in Spa, he was very fast on Saturday [in qualifying], finishing third.
"He was allowed to start from position two, and according to the calculations, third place would have been possible.
"But we saw that his tyres had deteriorated significantly more. He couldn't push, and on top of that, we only had two sets of medium tyres and one set of the hard compound, while the competition had two sets of hard and one set of medium tyres. That was perhaps a decisive point.
"Pérez doesn't need to get faster, just more consistent. And given the alternatives, he is still our best solution."
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