Horner hopes Perez will ‘take confidence’ from Hungarian GP – but warns inconsistency ‘needs to change’

Christian Horner has praised Sergio Perez's drive in Hungary as one of his strongest races in several rounds, whilst also acknowledging that the Mexican’s lack of consistency across all three days of a race weekend “needs to change”.

It was an event of ups and downs for Perez, who arrived at the Hungaroring in need of a good result after some tough weekends of late. While he performed well during Friday’s practice sessions, the 34-year-old suffered a disastrous Q1 exit in Saturday’s qualifying, with a crash into the barriers putting him out of the running and leaving him in P16 on the grid.

READ MORE: Piastri wins Hungarian Grand Prix as Norris belatedly hands back lead in McLaren intra-team drama

Despite a slow start to the race, Perez made ground as the afternoon progressed and eventually crossed the line in P7 to finish one place ahead of George Russell in the Mercedes.

Reflecting on the six-time race winner’s pace in Hungary, Horner said: “Checo’s race actually starting on the hard [tyre], he dropped behind Russell, but as soon as he got into clean air after that first pit stop, his pace actually was very similar to McLaren.

“So he’s driven a good race today and the strategy with Checo, getting the undercut on George, and going a bit earlier worked really well for him. He had good pace, made some good passes and hopefully will take some confidence out of this.”

With Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris taking a one-two result for McLaren – while Max Verstappen finished in fifth following late-race contact with Lewis Hamilton – Horner admitted that it is crucial for Red Bull to score more points at the next round of the calendar in Belgium.

READ MORE: ‘I want things to be done better’ fumes Verstappen after Hungarian GP as he admits Red Bull now behind McLaren

“McLaren obviously have a lot of pace at the moment, they had a big score today and we obviously need to start scoring big points from next weekend onwards,” the Team Principal added.

To do this, the team will need Perez to qualify in a higher position on Saturday. Horner is hopeful that the driver’s good performance on Sunday at the Hungaroring may help him to feel more confident going forward.

“That was probably Checo’s strongest race since China [in April], I would say, so yeah he should take some confidence out of today’s race,” said Horner. “If he’d have qualified more in position, you’d have seen he would have been in a much more competitive position.”

MONDAY MORNING DEBRIEF: Why did McLaren pit Norris before Piastri – and did they really need to?

However, when pushed on the fact that Perez has struggled to be in this position for all three days of a race weekend, Horner conceded: “Yep, and that’s something that needs to change.”