Sergio Perez’s four-year stint at Red Bull is at an end – and with that, his Formula 1 career appears to be over too.
The 34-year-old who started his 281st grand prix this year has been shown the door at the end of the season with two years left to run on his contract.
This isn’t unfamiliar territory for Perez: the same happened to him in 2021 when Racing Point let him go. But on that occasion Red Bull rode to his rescue. This time there are no vacancies on the grid for 2025.
Perez has lasted longer as Max Verstappen’s team mate than any other driver: Daniel Ricciardo walked after less than three years, Pierre Gasly was booted out after half a season and Alexander Albon lasted a year and a half. The team showered him with praise for the role he played in helping Verstappen clinch his first world championship in 2021 by delaying his rival Lewis Hamilton during the title-deciding race in Abu Dhabi.
Even three years on the team was still introducing him as the ‘Mexican minister of defence’ at their season launch. But Perez’s 14 years as an F1 driver deserves to be remembered for much more than the time he successfully played rear-gunner. Here are 10 of his best performances since his debut.
10. 2022 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
Grid: 1st; Race: 4th
Early in 2022 Perez appeared to click more readily with Red Bull’s first answer to Formula 1’s new ground effect regulations. He claimed his first pole position in Jeddah and looked on course to take victory until a poorly-timed Virtual Safety Car period helped Verstappen and the Ferrari drivers get ahead of him. He was therefore under-rewarded for one of his best performances in a front-running car.
9. 2013 Indian Grand Prix
Grid: 9th; Race: 5th
Perez’s McLaren stint was considered a failure at the time. However it wasn’t appreciated at the time that the team was heading into a slump which it has only recently emerged from: It was the first of eight consecutive seasons in which they failed to win a race.
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This was another race characterised by heavy tyre degradation: eventual winner Sebastian Vettel pitted for fresh rubber just two laps in. In a season when McLaren fell to fifth in the championship, Perez’s run to fifth in the Indian Grand Prix was their best result until the final race of the season, and one of few highlights that year.
8. 2011 Australian Grand Prix
Grid: 13th; Race: Disqualified (rear wing)
A solid debut performance which should have been rewarded with a points finish yielded nothing as both Saubers were disqualified for rear wing infringements. Perez started four places behind team mate Kamui Kobayashi but led him to the chequered flag.
This was Formula 1’s first race after switching to new tyre supplier Pirelli. Perez proved a master of their fragile early rubber from the off, rising up the order on a single-stop strategy.
7. 2023 Azerbaijan Grand Prix
Grid: 3rd; Race: 1st
A trend emerged over Perez’s four years at Red Bull, in which he would perform better earlier in the season, then tail off as they year went on. In 2023 he won twice during his early purple patch, including at Baku – always a strong venue for Perez – where he simply out-ran Verstappen.
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Azerbaijan’s circuit has remained one of his best venues: even amid the purgatory of the second half of his 2024 campaign, Perez was on course to out-score Verstappen in Baku until his needless late collision with Sainz.
6. 2016 European Grand Prix
Grid: 7th; Race: 3rd
Perez clicked immediately with Baku’s unusual, high-speed street circuit. He finished on the podium on his debut but it could have been even better – he originally qualified on the front row but a grid penalty due to a gearbox change following a crash in practice meant he started seventh.
5. 2012 Italian Grand Prix
Grid: 12th; Race: 2nd
Another race which underlined Perez’s credentials as a ‘tyre whisperer’. He started on hards, ran long and switched to mediums, then picked off the likes of Kimi Raikkonen, Nico Rosberg and Ferrari pair Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso for second.
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Towards the end of the race he began to close on leader Lewis Hamilton, so much so that McLaren advised their driver to increase his pace. No wonder McLaren considered Perez worth a punt as Hamilton’s replacement the following year.
4. 2014 Bahrain Grand Prix
Grid: 4th; Race: 3rd
After being axed by McLaren just one year into his stint at the team, Perez teamed up with Nico Hulkenberg to form an all-new line-up at Force India. Many expected Hulkenberg to have the beating of his team mate, but Perez came out on top when the pair crossed swords at the second round of the season in Bahrain, proving his lack of podium finishes the year before had been more the car’s fault than his.
3. 2022 Monaco Grand Prix
Grid: 3rd; Race: 1st
Conditions at the track to do exactly that in 2022 race. Lining up third ahead of Verstappen – who reportedly suspected his team mate deliberately crashed in qualifying to secure his place ahead of him – he tracked the Ferrari drivers early in the race.
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Timing his switch to slick tyres to perfection, Perez jumped into the lead and stayed there, resisting pressure from Carlos Sainz Jnr as his tyres grained badly over the final laps.
1. 2012 Malaysian Grand Prix
Grid: 9th; Race: 2nd
An early switch to wet weather tyres as rain fell at Sepang proved an inspired move for Perez, which put him in the lead of a race for the first time in his F1 career. He lost the lead to Fernando Alonso in the pits due to a quick Ferrari tyre change, but spent the rest of the race tailing his rival.
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As Perez held second and cut Alonso’s lead from over seven seconds to one, his race engineer Marco Schupbach warned him at one stage “Checo, be careful, we need this position,” which some considered a coded warning to let their engine supplier win. However it was true that Sauber needed the second place, and arguably Perez also needed the warning, as he slid off the wet track more than once. That didn’t stop him delivering Sauber’s best result as an independent team.
1. 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix
Grid: 5th; Race: 1st
Perez had to wait longer than any other driver – 190 races – for his first grand prix win. But when it finally came he delivered it in style – and at a time when his future in F1 was in serious doubt. He was just one week away from his final start for Racing Point, who had terminated his contract for the next two seasons in order to hire Sebastian Vettel.
The Sakhir Grand Prix, a one-off held in the pandemic-struck 2020 season on Bahrain’s unusual Outer circuit, got off to a frantic start. Perez made it up to third behind the two Mercedes when Charles Leclerc punted him off.
From 18th, Perez mounted an astounding charge back to win. It was a night of competing fairytale stories: George Russell could have won in his first appearance for Mercedes as a substitute for Lewis Hamilton, but his misfortune handed victory to the driver whose career was hanging by a thread.
After the season finale, Red Bull signed him up, and the Sakhir Grand Prix proved not Perez’s penultimate start but his first of six grand prix wins.
Over to you
What do you rate among the best performances of Perez’s career? Have your say in the comments.
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