Palmer: 'Perez’s poor qualifying performances have rendered him redundant'

According to Palmer, Bottas had a perfect Sunday. "It was important for Hamilton that Bottas won. While Bottas was keeping the smiles on the faces of Mercedes though, Perez put in a well-timed gritty drive as well, getting back onto the podium for the first time in eight races", Palmer says in his column for the official website of the Formula 1.

"Too often recently Perez’s poor qualifying performances have rendered him redundant in helping Verstappen’s fight with Hamilton on Sundays. Perez’s race pace has been closer to Verstappen’s than his qualifying pace and again on Sunday, he was really solid in tricky conditions. But where he excelled most was in damaging Hamilton’s race, something it seemed clear he was intent on doing by the way he fought to keep the Brit behind him, when a couple of times in battle it looked like the place was lost."

Second drivers can make the difference

So far, Verstappen and Hamilton's teammates have been unable to keep up with them, but Turkey shows just how important a team's second driver is. "This season so far the duo out front in the title race have just been too good, and really in another league from their teammates. Hamilton has only finished behind Perez twice now, while Turkey was, incredibly, the first time all year that Verstappen has finished a race behind Bottas", the former F1 driver continues.

"While the number twos have been ineffective at taking points off their rivals thus far, Turkey illustrated the role of the second driver could be crucial. With Bottas hitting some consistent form at the moment, and Perez looking to regain his mojo, it could make a deciding difference to the tightest title battle in years."