Red Bull made the controversial decision to force Sergio Perez to drive a stricken car back to the pits to hand Max Verstappen the advantage in the weekend’s Canadian Grand Prix
F1 pundit Will Buxton slammed Red Bull for ‘endangering’ drivers with their controversial Sergio Perez decision apparently reminiscent of the 2008 ‘Crashgate’.
The Mexican crashed with 19 laps to go of the Canadian Grand Prix on Sunday. He lost control of his car, span around and hit the barrier – wrecking the rear wing.
Despite that, he did not retire immediately. Perez was told to drive to the pits to retire instead of pulling over on the side of the track, a decision that appeared as though it was made with Max Verstappen’s lead in mind.
Stewards were unimpressed with that decision and they fined Red Bull £21,000 and handed Perez – who has just penned a new contract with the side – a three-place grid drop for this season’s next race.
Despite that, F1 pundit Buxton was not convinced the punishment was enough having compared the situation to the infamous ‘Crashgate’ at the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix. Renault driver Nelson Piquet Jr was accused of crashing on purpose, necessitating a safety car and effectively handing teammate Fernando Alonso victory.
Taking to Twitter, Buxton said: “Personally I don’t think the repercussions for the team are anywhere near enough. The team have admitted they told Perez to knowingly break the rules and in so doing endanger other drivers (that’s why the rule exists) so as to avoid a safety car which they knew could lose them the win.
“Reverse the outcome of the reasoning and you have a team telling a driver to break the rules to create a safety car to help them win. It’s a few degrees of separation. One is a grid drop and a fine. The other is Singapore 08.
“Absolutely not saying it was deliberate. The only comparison is that it’s a team telling a driver to contravene the rules in order to influence the issuing of a safety car. Simply find it interesting Red Bull would admit their thinking on this so openly.”
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Buxton appears to have retracted his comments, with the tweets now deleted from his Twitter account. Perez and Verstappen both gave their thoughts on the incident after the Canadian GP.
Taking to social media, Perez wrote: “I’m very sorry for my team, I let them down today. But we will come back no doubt. There’s a very long way to go.”
Meanwhile, Verstappen said: “I think the damage was done yesterday [in qualifying], of course, for Checo. Starting in the back, it’s very hard in these conditions. Then, of course, I saw him retire with the damage.
“So I knew that I had to score big, of course, to not let the other teams catch up a lot. But I do think at the end of the day, as long as you keep winning, so you score 25 points, even if the others finish P2, P3, you don’t really lose out too much. And then you kind of can afford sometimes these one-offs.”
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