Sergio Perez has revealed how a set-up “compromise” after the Sprint contributed to him sustaining a “messy” qualifying session at Formula 1’s Chinese Grand Prix.
Perez had the pace to match Max Verstappen in the wet conditions earlier in the weekend, but he was powerless to prevent his Red Bull team-mate from taking pole.
The Mexican had encountered struggles from the opening segment and was fortunate to avoid a surprise elimination as he ended Q1 on the border in 15th position.
However, Perez progressed to the top-10 shootout and recovered from a lacklustre initial run to secure a Red Bull front-row lock-out, three-tenths down on Verstappen.
“Yeah, didn’t have a good run in my first run of Q3, which really set me back,” Perez said. “I don’t know what happened.
“Obviously tyres were a little bit cooler and it was just a step worse; we were playing around with the front wing. So it just felt like it put us in the back foot for my final run.
“And then all of a sudden in the final run I think the track was just getting quite a bit better and I managed to put a good lap together.
“I think just all the way to that lap, it had been a very messy qualifying starting from Q1, you know, I nearly was knocked out.
“I had traffic on my first attempt with the Williams and had to come back to the pit. So I, yeah, I was just out of position a lot of the time.
“And with the change of wind, it was important to be out there at the right time to make sure that you get that progression, that learning from these new conditions.”
Perez capitalised on Carlos Sainz and Fernando Alonso’s squabble in the closing stages to rise from sixth to third in the Sprint, behind Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton.
With the new format permitting set-up changes as parc ferme restrictions lifted, Perez has disclosed that his side of the garage made sizeable alterations to his RB20.
“We did a lot of changes trying to adapt to the new conditions effectively, like Max says, you know, the change in wind has been quite substantial.
“And I think given that it’s quite a low grip circuit, a bit of a change in the wind conditions does affect a lot more than probably other places.
“So, yeah, just we learnt a lot from the conditions earlier in the Sprint and we adjust accordingly. So that was important for me to have a read on.”
Perez divulged that higher-than-anticipated degradation in race-trim triggered the tweaks on his side, which he suspects hindered the balance of his car over one lap.
“We did suffer a lot with the tyre deg and with rear deg,” he explained. “So yeah just making sure that we were able to have a more stable platform which was important.
“But obviously that doesn’t come for free, you know, then you’re making other compromises in different sort of corner speeds.
“I just couldn’t get a good read through the conditions. I think my first proper lap was in Q2, run two, and then run one in Q3 was quite far off.
“So yeah, it wasn’t the smoothest qualifying session out there, but it still is a good result for tomorrow.”
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