MEXICO CITY – As his son watched, his arms draped on the right side of the stage at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, Sergio Pérez soaked up the adulation of his home fans.
Although Max Verstappen had won the race for Red Bull, Pérez captured the crowd’s attention in third place after scoring his first Mexican Grand Prix podium. Although it was his fifth podium of the 2021 season, it was the first time a Mexican driver had achieved such a result at home, making it an important result for both him and his country.
Three years later, things have changed dramatically.
Pérez remains the star in Mexico. This remains are weekend, his face graced billboards across the city as brands and sponsors tried to cash in on his stardom. Red Bull team boss Christian Horner joked that Pérez “endorsed every product from Uber Eats to toilet paper” this weekend.
But at the moment, with poor form that has seen him drop to eighth in the world championship standings, another podium finish for Pérez would carry even more weight.
“I know I had a terrible season, a very difficult season,” Pérez admitted on Thursday. “It started very well, but it was very, very difficult. If I get a strong result, it can certainly change my season a lot in terms of (my) personal feelings.”
Pérez arrives in Mexico without a podium finish since the Chinese Grand Prix in April. A season that started promisingly, with Red Bull looking one step ahead of its rivals, quickly fell apart as he struggled with the car. A lack of balance that robbed the drivers of confidence this year only affected Max Verstappen towards the end of the European season. It hurt Pérez much earlier.
The resulting dip in form put Pérez’s future in the spotlight. Red Bull saw its lead erode at the start of the year when McLaren, aided by two high-scoring drivers, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, brought him in and eventually consolidated him at the top of the Constructors’ Championship. While Verstappen has maintained a decent buffer at the top of the drivers’ standings, Red Bull is now at risk of slipping into P3 behind Ferrari – just eight points behind. That would be the lowest manufacturer result since 2019.
Even before Mexico, Pérez felt the need to respond to rumors that he would announce his plan to retire from F1 altogether at his home race. During the three-week break from Singapore, he posted a video clip from “The Wolf of Wall Street,” in which Leonardo di Caprio’s character, Jordan Belfort, confidently says the words of his staff to the effect, “I’m not leaving.”
Sorry 😂🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/rPIHpYDVGH
— Sergio Pérez (@SCHecoPerez) September 29, 2024
“I felt like every year for the last two years, someone makes up this rumor and everyone picks up on it,” Pérez explained in Austin last week when asked about the post. “All my fans, I am obviously very aware that there are a lot of people coming to support me at the Mexican Grand Prix, and they are probably expecting something that is not true.
“I felt the need to just say, look, I think it’s just not right to spread these kinds of rumors without knowing the facts.”
The frequency of these rumors is due to the criticism leveled at Pérez’s underperformance and future, despite being under contract for the next two seasons. His extension was intended to give him stability at a time when his form was declining and act as an extra arm around the shoulder – proof that he had the team’s support.
It did not have the desired effect. Pérez still hasn’t finished in the top five since the deal was announced shortly before the Canadian Grand Prix. He was battling for the podium in Azerbaijan last month, but a late collision with Carlos Sainz ended his race.
On Friday, Horner agreed with Pérez’s assessment that his season had been ‘terrible’, saying the Mexican had ‘summed it up perfectly’.
“It’s been a bad year for Checo,” Horner said. “He started strong and from Imola onwards he clearly struggled with his form. It’s been sporadic. We saw flashes of performance. (In) Azerbaijan he might have won that race almost a month ago.
‘We know what he is capable of. We hope we can give him the set-up and confidence in the car to deliver the performance we know he is capable of.”
Verstappen’s increasing struggles during the summer races indicated that Pérez was not solely responsible for his decline in form. The upgrades that arrived in Austin helped alleviate some of Verstappen’s concerns, but Pérez – who qualified ninth and only finished seventh – didn’t have the full package. “We just didn’t have a good weekend,” he reflected in Mexico. “It was not a good weekend in which I built up a lot of confidence.”
Confidence is something that Red Bull has long been trying to bring back to Pérez, with an eye to 2025. “Checo is our driver,” said Horner. “He has a contract for 2025. He is competitive. He’s hungry. He’s not happy with where he is now. So as a team we are doing our utmost to support him.”
Horner was asked how Liam Lawson’s performance at RB could influence the plan of the two Red Bull teams, given the ties he could potentially replace Pérez with in the event of a change at Red Bull. Horner reiterated that Pérez “has a contract for next year, so he is currently our driver for 2025.”
“There is a seat available at RB and they are all Red Bull drivers on loan,” said Horner. “We have the advantage of having time to sit down with Laurent (Mekies) and Peter (Bayer) and look at all options.”
If there was one race of the remaining five where the energy of the event and the crowd could provide an extra boost of energy to fuel Pérez, it’s Mexico. The intensity of the race weekend is like nothing else he experiences in F1. He described it as “three races at the same time.” The noise from the stands during his first outlap at the start of FP1 was bigger than most drivers will hear all season in their honour. Such is the excitement of the more than 100,000 Mexicans crammed into the track, the majority bursting into color and noise in the Foro Sol stadium area.
The demands of racing at home make for a tough week. Yet it does not detract from how special the Grand Prix is for him. “I just want to enjoy it,” he said in Austin. “This is my ninth Grand Prix in Mexico, so I want to make sure I enjoy every part of it because it is a very important one.”
The only sound Pérez wants to hear this weekend comes from the stands. The constant speculation and debate about his future? It doesn’t bother him. “You just have to make sure you keep your head down and focus on the things you can control,” Pérez said. “The rest is something you can’t worry about.”
Ending his podium drought on home soil would be a perfect way for Pérez to clear up some questions about his future at Red Bull. It would also give him the opportunity for another priceless moment, like the one with his son three years ago.
“That moment will stay with me forever, with my son up there on the stage watching me,” Pérez said. “It’s something I hope he will remember forever. If not, at least I have the photo to show him when he’s older!
“Those moments are, I think, the moments that really matter to me. And I hope I can repeat that this weekend.”
Remembering the moment Sergio Perez’s son saw his father on the podium at his home Grand Prix 💚🇲🇽
(via rsanchezp/IG) pic.twitter.com/tsFzL1JMHu
— ESPN F1 (@ESPNF1) July 12, 2022
Top photo: Mark Thompson/Getty Images