Perez “very pissed off” with ‘disastrous’ Q3 in Baku F1 qualifying

The Mexican was the faster Red Bull driver throughout Friday practice and looked to be in contention to fight for his maiden F1 pole position after a strong start to qualifying.

But Perez’s day unraveled in Q3 when an lock-up on his first flying lap left him only seventh. Perez was prevented from improving when a red flag caused by Yuki Tsunoda’s crash brought Q3 to a premature end.

Perez will move up one position on the starting grid to sixth thanks to Lando Norris’ penalty, but he was nevertheless disappointed with how his qualifying panned out having made a step forward with his understanding of the RB16B in Baku.

“It was a big disappointment today,” said Perez. “I was on a great lap, into Turn 4, I was about two-tenths up on my time, and I locked up.

“I think I was a little bit too close to Lando, and the wind picked up. I locked up, I lost the lap.

“I was pretty confident of getting a good lap time out of it. We’ve been strong all weekend. But in Q3, really when it mattered, it was a disaster.

“I’m very, very pissed off today given that we should definitely be in the top two, on the front row, at very least,” he added.

"But there are a lot of positives. I think we should be able to have a strong race pace as well.”

Traffic also proved frustrating for Perez in Q3, leaving him unable to find a good position to start his lap as the drivers jockeyed for position in a bid to gain a slipstream from each other.

“With the out laps, the track is so big, but because we all want to be together, it’s a disaster, starting that lap,” he explained.

‘Actually in terms of track position, Q3 was the worst that I had all weekend.

“We all went at the same time, and people created gaps, but then other people overtaking, not respecting the gentleman’s agreement. It just made things a bit harder.

“We didn’t put the lap when it really counted today. As simple as that.”