Red Bull chief Horner honest about Perez's F1 title chances against Verstappen

31 May 2023 , 19:18

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Sergio Perez' qualifying crash ruined his Monaco Grand Prix weekend (Image: Getty Images)

Christian Horner refused to rule Sergio Perez out of this year's title race – and also dodged the suggestion an unbeaten season may be on the cards for Red Bull.

Horner joked: "You're trying to get me to do an Arsene Wenger here, aren't you?" as he was asked about the idea of winning every race this year after success in the Monaco Grand Prix. And he had every right to be in a good mood given how Max Verstappen had led the race from start to finish despite a sudden downpour.

Red Bull now have six wins from as many races this year and are dominating both championships. Perez would have been much less upbeat, though, after crashing in qualifying and then failing to reach the points positions on race day.

"It was a horrible weekend for Checo," Horner told reporters including Mirror Sport. "It went wrong in Q1 and that really puts you on the back foot. We took a really aggressive strategy to stop on lap one and you could see his pace in free air and how much the others were saying.

"He actually got back within the pit window of Esteban Ocon. But then [Logan] Sargeant and the slow cars starting to struggle, and of course you can't overtake. He then got in a kerfuffle with [George] Russell and damaged the front wing.

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"It was just one of those weekends where nothing went his way. He had a massive save in the swimming pool and probably needed a change of underwear after that. But it's just been one of those weekends for him where you just turn a page and I think, for him, the sooner we get to Barcelona the better."

Christian Horner is still refusing to draw any conclusions about this year's F1 title races (Getty Images)

Verstappen now has a 39-point cushion over his team-mate, though Horner was not willing to suggest the Dutchman is now beyond Perez's reach as a result. "I think it's so early to predict that," he said. "There's still 14 [sic] races to go and a lot that can go wrong. We're six races into this championship.

"Max is doing brilliantly – Checo had a weekend to forget here but he's been on great form and we're going to see what the output of the upgrades [for other teams] is in Barcelona next weekend. It's impossible to judge here. There's so much jeopardy and we saw with the weather here there are so many factors that can go wrong."

And, of the prospect of going unbeaten in 2023, he added: "The competition is so strong and anything can happen. We're just taking it one race at a time. I don't think we're going to allow ourselves to dream. We'll maximise every weekend and then let's see where we end up."

Daniel Moxon