It is often said that history is written by the victors, but in the high-octane, ruthless world of Formula 1, the truth often waits until the contracts expire. That moment has finally arrived.
On January 5, 2026, the motorsport world was rocked to its core when former Red Bull Racing driver Sergio “Checo” Perez broke his silence in a feature-length interview on the Spanish podcast Cracks, hosted by Oso Trava. Released just days ago, the conversation—recorded back in November 2025—serves as a devastating post-mortem of Perez’s four-year tenure at the Milton Keynes squad. With Christian Horner and Helmut Marko having famously departed the team late last year, and Perez himself now secure in a landmark seat with the newly formed Cadillac F1 team, the Mexican veteran had no reason to hold back.
And he didn’t.
What Perez revealed goes far beyond the typical “driver excuses” or complaints about strategy. Instead, he painted a picture of a team that, from his very first day in the factory, explicitly told him he was a regulatory necessity, not a competitive asset. The claims, backed by technical nuance and corroborated by years of data, suggest that the “second seat” at Red Bull wasn’t just difficult—it was structurally designed to fail.
The “Day One” Confession
The most explosive takeaway from the interview—and the one currently setting social media ablaze—is a conversation Perez claims took place during his very first meeting with Team Principal Christian Horner.
According to Perez, the transparency was brutal. He alleges Horner told him directly: “We race with two cars because we have to race with two cars. But this project was created for Max. Max is our talent.”
For any elite athlete, hearing that your presence is merely a bureaucratic check-box would be a career-ending demoralizer. Most drivers might have walked away then and there. Perez, however, stayed. He accepted the terms, believing he could carve out a role as the ultimate team player—a belief that was validated, at least initially. His heroic defense against Lewis Hamilton in Abu Dhabi 2021, which played a pivotal role in securing Max Verstappen’s first World Championship, cemented his status as a “legend” in Verstappen’s own words.
But beneath the champagne and podium celebrations, Perez describes an environment where success was a double-edged sword. “At Red Bull, everything was a problem,” Perez told Cracks. “If I was very fast, it created tension. If I was faster than Max, that was a problem. If I was slower than Max, that was also a problem.”
This paradox created a psychological trap: there was no “winning” scenario. Outperforming the golden child disrupted the team’s carefully curated equilibrium, while underperforming confirmed the pre-existing bias that he was merely a placeholder.
The Physics of Failure: “Mental Resilience Cannot Override Physics”
For years, pundits and fans have debated why highly rated drivers like Pierre Gasly, Alexander Albon, and Sergio Perez seem to “forget” how to drive the moment they step into a Red Bull cockpit. The prevailing narrative—often pushed by the team itself—was that the pressure of being Verstappen’s teammate broke them mentally.
Perez’s interview dismantles this narrative with cold, hard technical precision. He argues that the issue wasn’t in his head, but in the wind tunnel.
The technical divergence began in earnest in 2022 with the introduction of the ground-effect regulations. The RB18 launched significantly overweight—estimates put it at 10 to 15 kilograms over the minimum limit. This excess weight, largely at the front, created a car with a stable understeer balance. It was predictable. It was planted. And crucially, it suited Perez’s smooth, preservation-focused driving style perfectly. During this period, Perez claims simulator data often showed him matching or beating Verstappen.
Then came the upgrades.
As Red Bull aggressively shed weight to find lap time, the car’s characteristics shifted fundamentally. The development path moved toward a “sharp,” incredibly responsive front end—a characteristic that Verstappen, a generational talent with a unique ability to handle unstable rear ends, thrives on. Conversely, for a driver like Perez who relies on feeling the car “settle” into a corner, this evolution was catastrophic.
“Mental resilience cannot override physics,” Perez stated, a line that is sure to become iconic in F1 lore. “You cannot outthink an unpredictable rear axle at 300 km/h.”
This isn’t just a driver’s excuse. Tech analysts like Mark Hughes have long noted that Red Bull’s development philosophy naturally converges around Verstappen’s extraterrestrial ability to cope with instability. Even Pierre Waché, Red Bull’s Technical Director, is cited in the video as admitting that while they didn’t intentionally build the car only for Max, the pursuit of pure theoretical speed leads to a handling balance that only Max can exploit.
By Barcelona 2023, the turning point was complete. An underbody upgrade introduced there shattered Perez’s confidence. He went from trading wins with Verstappen to languishing a second per lap behind. He lost the intuitive connection with the machine, and hesitation in Formula 1 is measured in tenths of a second.
Gaslighting and the £6,000 Psychologist
Perhaps the most damaging allegation regarding the team’s culture is how they handled these technical struggles. Rather than acknowledging that the car had drifted away from Perez’s operating window, the team insisted the problem was psychological.
Perez revealed that when his results dipped, the immediate response was to send him to therapy. Helmut Marko, the team’s stern advisor, arranged sessions with a sports psychologist.
“£6,000,” Perez recalled. “That’s what a single call cost. I sent the bill to Marco, he paid it, and that’s how it went for three years.”
While Perez admits that confidence issues eventually did set in—focusing on “not crashing” rather than “going fast”—he maintains that the root cause was mechanical. Treating a handling imbalance with psychotherapy is, in his view, a fundamental misunderstanding of the sport. It paints a picture of corporate gaslighting: convincing a driver they are mentally broken to avoid admitting the car has become undriveable for anyone but the lead pilot.
The Graveyard of the “Second Seat”
Perez’s testimony provides a unifying theory for the struggles of every teammate Verstappen has had since Daniel Ricciardo left.
Pierre Gasly (2019): Lasted 12 races. Demoted. Called the environment “negative and unfair.”
Alexander Albon (2019-2020): Described a “snowball effect” where the car became sharper and sharper to suit Max, leaving him with “no mental energy left” and feeling “completely destroyed.”
Liam Lawson & Yuki Tsunoda: Looking at the “future” context provided by the video (2024-2025 seasons), Perez points out that his replacements fared no better. Lawson lasted two races. Tsunoda managed a meager seven points in a full season.
The pattern is undeniable. The system is efficient at winning championships with one car, but it is a meat grinder for the driver in the other. As Perez notes, the seat he occupied is arguably the “worst job in Formula 1,” a position that has now chewed through multiple careers in quick succession.
Vindication and a New Beginning
Despite the bitterness of the professional environment, one relationship seems to have survived the turmoil: the one between the drivers themselves.
Perez went out of his way to clarify that his grievances are with the system, not with Max Verstappen. In a touching detail, he revealed that after the podcast aired, Verstappen publicly expressed his respect, and the two exchanged helmets. Verstappen’s message on the visor read: “Thank you for being a great teammate and friend.”
It is a crucial distinction. Perez acknowledges Verstappen’s greatness. He isn’t claiming he is faster than Max; he is claiming that no driver on earth could be competitive in a team so singularly obsessed with one man’s specific geometric preferences.
Now, as the 2026 season dawns, Perez has moved on. In a historic move, he has joined the newly entered Cadillac F1 team alongside Valtteri Bottas. It is a fresh start, a multi-year deal with equal status—something he never possessed at Red Bull.
“I have nothing left to prove,” Perez said, citing his contribution to two Constructor’s Championships and five victories during his Red Bull stint.
The Verdict
As Red Bull Racing faces a new era without its longtime leadership of Horner and Marko, and with the championship having narrowly slipped away in 2025, Perez’s words serve as a stark warning. The philosophy of putting all eggs in one basket worked spectacularly for a time, but it has left the team structurally vulnerable.
For four years, fans wondered why Sergio Perez—a driver known for his tire management and midfield heroics—looked so lost in the fastest car on the grid. Now we know. He wasn’t lost; he was fighting a battle he was told on Day One he was never meant to win.
The revelation that the second Red Bull car was considered a “legal requirement” rather than a competitive entry changes how we look at the history of this dominant era. It vindicates Perez, Albon, and Gasly, and it casts a long, dark shadow over the legacy of a team that may have sacrificed everything—including the careers of world-class drivers—at the altar of Max Verstappen.
Sergio Perez may not have won the World Championship at Red Bull, but by speaking out, he may have just won the argument.