Sergio Perez bemoaned his lap two clash with Carlos Sainz Jr that ultimately cost the Sahara Force India driver a chance of a good result during the Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday.
The Mexican racer had made a good start from his lowly P18 grid slot, but made contact with Scuderia Toro Rosso driver Sainz on the run down to turn one on lap two while attempting an overtake, which damaged his car and necessitated an early trip to the pits.
Thereafter, Perez was struggling for pace and was never in points contention, with high tyre degradation ensuring he finished the race down in sixteenth position.
“Not the best of weekends for me: I knew I had to get a good start after yesterday’s qualifying result and I managed to pull off a great one, making up a lot of ground,” said Perez.
“Unfortunately, on lap two I made contact with [Carlos] Sainz, which ended up destroying my race. I was in his tow and when I went onto the marbles on the inside I just couldn’t stop the car enough. It was a real shame as the pace was there to score a good amount of points.
“During the rest of the race we had a lot of tyre degradation, but it’s too early to draw conclusions about what happened today: we need to go back to HQ and look at the data to make sure we come back strongly in China.
“We haven’t been very lucky in the first two races, even though our pace has been good, so I’m sure things will turn in our favour soon.”