Sergio Pérez says his eleventh place finish in the 2019 Austrian Grand Prix is “the reality of our speed” as the Racing Point F1 Team once again failed to score championship points.
Pérez started the race from thirteenth having qualified sixteenth, benefitting from a raft of penalties for some ahead. During the race however, he was only able to benefit from a torrid day for the Haas F1 Team as both their drivers plummeted down the field, promoting Pérez to eleventh in the early stages of the race where he stayed until the end, applying pressure to Antonio Giovinazzi for the final world championship point.
“We gave it everything today, but points were just out of reach,” said Pérez.
“My start was good, but I locked up into turn three trying to get ahead of Giovinazzi and that’s pretty much where I stayed for the rest of the race – trying to chase him down.
“There was not much difference between the soft and the medium tyres in the first part of the race and most of the cars ahead of us were able to run a very similar strategy.
“There were no real opportunities to do anything different. It’s always frustrating to finish in P11, but that’s the reality of our speed today.”
The result extends Pérez’s run of non-point-scoring races to five, having failed to finish inside the top ten since his sixth place finish in Azerbaijan. The Mexican now sits thirteenth in the drivers’ standings on thirteen points, seven clear of his team-mate Lance Stroll while Racing Point are now seventh in the consstructors’ standings and starting to lose touch with the mid-field leaders.
