Perez: We expected the opponents to be much stronger

Sergio Perez finished second in Bahrain and provided post-race commentary on the key events of the first stage of the season.

Question: You started from 5th position and finished second: are you satisfied with the result achieved?

Sergio Perez: I think yes, if you start from 5th position, it’s always nice if you manage to make progress. I had to fight to get him, and in situations like that you just have to use a different tactic. When the car is driving in traffic, it slides a lot more. I think overall the team achieved an excellent result. But the rivalry with Ferrari, and at the start of the race with Mercedes, was very intense.

Question: You were given soft tires for the last part of the distance. Behind you was Carlos Sainz on hard tires. Have you had any concerns at this stage of the race?

Sergio Perez: Yes, I understood that I had to save the tires because he forced us to make an early pit stop, and we really had to do that. I had to drive a very long stretch, but we managed to gradually increase and maintain the lead, and we did a good job.

But towards the end of the race some problems started with the car for other reasons, which noticeably increased the degradation.

Question: How comfortable would you have been driving the RB20 without this relegation situation?

Sergio Perez: I think we were pleasantly surprised today. We definitely expected the opponents to be much stronger. I believe that on this circuit there is usually a very intense degradation of rubber, but in Jeddah we will face difficulties of a completely different nature, so it will be interesting how we will look there compared to the others.

Q: You won in Saudi Arabia last year – are you looking forward to returning to this circuit?

Sergio Perez: Yeah right. I also believe that the high-speed nature of the Jeddah circuit suits our car well, and that we will be able to perform successfully again next weekend.

Question: Don’t you think switching to soft tires for the last part of the race was a bit of a risky decision given the level of degradation at this circuit? Or were you confident that you could stay ahead?

Sergio Perez: Yes, it is. I think the hard tires on the RB20 work worse than on other teams’ cars. Moreover, we are better off taking care of soft tires, so we did well to keep a fresh set of soft ones.

Q: What can you say about driving the new Red Bull car compared to last year’s RB19? Does this require a styling tweak, or does the ride feel more or less the same? Did you feel some sort of relief when you realized the RB20 was working flawlessly? After all, some other teams had not been able to get their modernized cars to work efficiently…

Sergio Perez: Yes, if you change anything in the concept, you obviously take risks, but everything works fine for us. The car requires almost the same approach to settings as last year’s RB19. I agree with my partner when he says she is just better in every way.

However, like all other teams, we continue to study the characteristics of our car. I think that if we end up on a different type of track, we will have to gather a lot of new information about the RB20. Hopefully we can continue to make progress and keep our modernization themes higher than those of our rivals.