Sergio Perez’s Japanese Grand Prix has been labelled as “a shocker” by Red Bull team principal Christian Horner, after the Mexican retired from the race following multiple collisions.
Starting from fifth on the grid, Perez’s race got off to a shocking start, after colliding with Carlos Sainz on the run into Turn 1.
This broke his front wing endplate and sent him into Lewis Hamilton, who was forced onto the grass.
Perez was forced to pit for a new front wing as a result, something which didn’t put him right at the back of the field as a Safety Car was summoned for debris on the circuit.
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Despite being aware of the Safety Car, Perez overtook drivers whilst entering the pits to get his new front wing, resulting in a five-second time penalty.
Not long later and the 33-year-old received another five-second time penalty for hitting Kevin Magnussen, following a ridiculous divebomb.
Perez broke yet another front wing for the process and was forced to pit for repairs yet again.
Not long after receiving a new front wing again, Red Bull called for Perez to retire the car.
At the time, he’d served one of the five-second time penalties; however, Red Bull got Perez back into the race in the closing stages so that he could serve his second time penalty, to avoid it being converted into a grid penalty in Qatar.
After serving the second penalty, Perez retired from the race.
It meant that Checo wasn’t on the circuit to help Red Bull celebrate winning the Constructors’ Championship, with Horner admitting that his race was poor.
“I mean, it was it was a shocker of a race for him today,” Horner told Sky Sports F1 after the race.
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“It got off to a bad start where he sort of got concertinaed on the rundown to Turn 1, he picked up some front wing damage, then we needed to change the front wing.
“He overtook Fernando [Alonso] on the way into the pit lane, then picked up a penalty and then came out and of course, then he dive bombed I think one of the Haas’ and so it was just one of those weekends.
“The only good thing was we were able to serve the penalty here, so he leaves it here in Japan.”