Horner: 'Perez need not fear for his place at Red Bull'
F1 News
- Toby McLuskie
These are tough weeks for Sergio Perez and Nyck de Vries. Two drivers under contract to Red Bull who are struggling with a major dip in their form. It is now whispered about De Vries, racing for AlphaTauri, that he has four races (including the Austrian GP) to improve his performance, otherwise he would lose his seat. Perez's future at Red Bull Racing has also been a topic of conversation among the media for a while.
Christian Horner addressed the situation of Perez and De Vries after qualifying at the Austrian GP. The Red Bull team boss had also just watched Perez fail to reach Q3 for the fourth race in a row, while the Dutch rookie was the slowest of the day. "Checo is safe," Horner said Sky Sports. "Everybody's fully behind so any talk about replacing Checo is wide of the mark."
De Vries is also safe
De Vries' situation is therefore reportedly more dire. "But there's no plan to replace Nick De Vries at the moment, so you know you got to give these guys a bit of time," Horner, who is known not to have been in favour of contracting the former Formula E world champion, explained.
In the wings, for example, Liam Lawson, who is causing a furore in Super Formula, is no doubt eager to step in at AlphaTauri. "Of course, we've got a junior programme. We've got you know Daniel in the stable as well. He's gonna be driving the car testing the Red Bull car after the Silverstone race so it'd be great to see where he's at and where his confidence is at."