As the 2024 Formula 1 season is reaching its final stages, there are still a few available seats on the grid for next year, with the hottest one being at Red Bull.
That is because Sergio Perez isn’t performing up to the standards required by the Milton Keynes outfit. Therefore, given the Mexican overall form this season, rumors started circulating that the team might be thinking about dropping him in favor of someone else, maybe Liam Lawson.
Lack of performance
By analyzing Perez’s races in 2024, it comes out that his average finish position is 8,65, so between P8 and P9. To calculate that number, we have also taken into account when he retired, but the result wouldn’t be much different even without the DNFs, as his average position would be P7.
Considering that in the first few races, Red Bull was still the fastest car by a great margin, and the Mexican was always around P2 and P3, the data show that for the rest of the year, he didn’t perform up to his teammate’s standard at all. In fact, Max Verstappen is still in the lead of the drivers’ championship and has always fought at the front of the field.
The Mexican was never on Verstappen’s level, maybe only in Azerbaijan he could have outscored him, but then crashed on the last lap with Carlos Sainz. Ferrari, McLaren, and Mercedes indeed closed the gap to Red Bull, which was no longer the most dominating car like it was in 2023, but it was still fast enough to fight on the same level as the other teams. However, if Verstappen managed to do so, Perez couldn’t extract all the potential out of the RB20.
Another crucial point linked to the Mexican performance in 2024 is that due to his lack of pace – as well as the other teams being more competitive -, Red Bull has now lost the leadership in the constructors’ championship and sits third in the standings behind McLaren and Ferrari. Moreover, considering how the two races after the break went, it seems unlikely that the Milton Keynes team will be able to fight to take the lead back.
It wouldn’t be fair to ask Perez to perform on Verstappen’s level every single weekend, because the Dutch driver showed he is of a different breed. However, if only he managed to have a smaller gap to his teammate, then maybe Red Bull could’ve totalized more points and still be fighting for the constructors’.
A liability rather than an asset
To make a complete analysis of why Red Bull might think about dropping him, considering how much a driver costs to the team is also important during the era of the budget cap. If a driver crashes too many times and becomes a liability for the outfit, then the latter cannot spend its money to develop the car and improve because it needs to pay for the damages.
Now, we don’t have exact data on how much a driver cost the team due to his crashes, but it seems that Perez is among those who created the highest amount of damage this year, costing Red Bull a fortune. That is also something that the team will think about while choosing who to sign next year.
The youngsters are ready
In order to get to a conclusion, we also need to analyze the options that Red Bull has if it decides to replace Perez. The latter is now 34 years old, and if on one hand, drivers like Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso have shown that it is possible to drive up until 40, on the other the Milton Keynes outfit knows that there are youngsters ready to jump in.
Names such as Lawson or Franco Colapinto surely made an impact this season, and leaving them without a seat could prove to be a mistake. Despite their lack of experience and time to prepare for Formula 1, they immediately delivered solid performances, showing that with some more preparation and time, they can be even more competitive.
Probably, it wouldn’t be such a crazy move for Red Bull to drop Perez and sign Lawson alongside Verstappen for the next season and allow its sister team RB F1 Team to sign Colapinto – who would otherwise be without a seat next year -.