Sergio Perez has labelled the form of his Red Bull team-mate Max Verstappen as ‘extreme’ as the Dutchman’s run of success continues.
Verstappen claimed his ninth successive grand prix victory last weekend at Zandvoort, equalling a decade-old marker laid down by Sebastian Vettel.
The two-time world champion has been beaten to the chequered flag only twice this season, finishing second to Perez on both occasions.
It leaves Verstappen with 339 points heading into the Italian Grand Prix versus the 201 of his Mexican team-mate.
“We’ve got to appreciate what Max is doing,” Perez said when asked what set the 25-year-old apart.
“At the level he’s driving at the moment, it’s extreme.
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“I think the ability he has to perform at his 100 percent every single weekend, no matter which conditions he’s driving at; it’s something that is quite hard to see as his team-mate.
“It doesn’t really matter what’s happened, whether we have a good margin or bad margins, or the car is behaving difficult, he’s been able to extract 100 percent out of him, out of the car, pretty much every weekend.”
Perez’s plight this season echoes a similar scenario in 2022, where his form waned as the year went on.
That was put down to developments in the car taking it in a direction that made it less comfortable for him and better suited to Verstappen.
“I think every driver through their careers or through each season, you get some upgrades to the car that adapt easier to your driving style than others,” Perez explained when asked if something similar is at play this year.
“It’s something that we all face through our time, during the season with the upgrades, and yeah, I haven’t been able to adapt as quickly as I should.
“I had to change a bit my driving style to adapt to the car more than in the beginning of the season, for example, when things were coming more naturally.
“But that’s something that most drivers, at some point, we go through.”
However, he added that he believes he’s not come through the other side of what has been a difficult period since the Monaco Grand Prix.
“It’s a long season in F1, and it doesn’t really matter, in my opinion, where we are now; it only matters where we are able to finish and then we can summarise our season in Abu Dhabi.
“Definitely, I went through a bit of a tough patch through the middle of the season where I was struggling the most with the car, but I think that’s all behind us and we should be having good races from now on.”
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