Will Buxton shut down the argument that the FIA are trying to help Red Bull after the stewards made a mistake during qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix.
Perez was one of a number of drivers throughout Friday up and down the racing ladder that were looked at for exceeding track limits in Spielberg, with lap times being deleted left, right and centre.
The Mexican left the track at Turn Eight after he ran wide in the first part of the chicane at Turn Seven, but the stewards were busy looking at other track limits violations, so they did not initially notice his error on the final lap of his Q3 run.
Pierre Gasly had already climbed out of his AlphaTauri in 11th place having been eliminated in Q2, and the top 10 shootout was about to start, so the stewards had no choice but to look at the incident after the end of qualifying.
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Buxton expressed his bemusement at this as, up to that point, the law on track limits had been black and white.
“So Perez clearly over white line in Q2 but it’s going to be looked at after? Thought it was supposed to be a hard and fast rule. Over the line, lose the time. I do not understand it at all,” he tweeted.
A fan then repeated the age-old conspiracy theory that Red Bull are being “helped” by the FIA, something Buxton is probably fed up of hearing by now.
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“Both Checo and Max [Verstappen] had laps deleted in qualifying. Wake up,” replied the Briton.
Ultimately, Perez’s final lap time in Q2 was deleted, as were all of his runs in Q3, so he was subsequently demoted to 13th – the position for which his best run in Q2 was good enough.