Perez predicts ‘painful day in the championship’ for Racing Point at F1 Eifel GP

Sergio Perez expects Racing Point to slip further behind in the constructors' championship following a tricky Formula 1 qualifying at the Eifel Grand Prix.

Perez was beaten by both Renaults in qualifying at the Nurburgring and could only manage ninth as he split the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz.

Going into this weekend’s race in Germany, only seven points separate McLaren, Racing Point and Renault in the constructors’ championship.

With Lance Stroll not racing due to illness, Nico Hulkenberg has been drafted in last minute and could only manage 20th on the grid meaning Racing Point is likely to be unable to score points with both cars.

“It all changed very quickly with Lance not coming in this morning, I could see some stress in the team, I didn’t really know what was happening, I hope health-wise Lance is okay and we can have him back soon,” Perez said. “For Nico as well it was tough to jump straight into qualifying so yeah it isn’t looking great for tomorrow having both Renaults there, the Ferrari, it can be a painful day in the championship tomorrow.”

The Mexican believes more was possible in qualifying and says only having one run in Q3 was a crucial factor in his starting position for Sunday’s race.

“Yeah I think we should definitely be higher up, we messed up a bit with our strategy, we thought we had a bit more pace and we tried the medium in Q1 which meant we lost basically a set for Q3, we only had one set in Q3 and I reckon the track changed a lot in that final run, the wind picked up a lot, the balance was pretty bad and unfortunately I only had one set.

“I went through on a single set of Softs so we could run a bit better in that regard but this conditions whenever it is windy it can hurt us quite a bit.”