Sergio Perez had previously shrugged off the importance of his crash at the Parabolica at the end of Friday's second practice session, but today admitted that it had indeed resulted in repercussions for qualifying.
Perez had been lucky to avoid major damage to his Red Bull when he understeered off into the gravel yesterday, narrowly avoiding a high speed impact with the barriers meaning that the overnight repairs hadn't been too onerous.
But the rebuilt car did suffer an oil leak at the end of final practice. It had curtailed his running time and led to a power unit change before qualifying. As a result, the Mexican felt he had gone into the session 'blind'.
"Adding a new engine and missing a large part of FP3 today was not ideal as it meant that we didn’t get to run the soft tyres before going into qualifying, so we were less prepared for Q3," he explained.
"I didn't run new tyres today before qualifying so it wasn't an ideal day, but it is what it is," he acknowledged afterward. "Considering the situation, missing FP3, [meant] basically going blind.
"Given how small the margins were, our preparation was not ideal," he admitted. "We had a lot of pace yesterday - I think yesterday was looking great - but unfortunately we didn't get to show what we were able to do today.
“This sort of things can happen," he shrugged. "Yesterday just disrupted the situation for us in terms of just having issues with the setup of the car for this morning.
"Unfortunately we also had issues also with the engine, so we had to change it. Yeah, it was a little bit too much," he said. "We had a good Friday and great race pace yesterday but today we just didn’t capitalise on our performance."
Perez was fifth fastest in the first round of qualifying, fourth in Q2, and ended the session back in fifth place which means he will start on the third row of the grid behind Charles Leclerc and George Russell.
Each round of qualifying required the drivers to run a different tyre compound - hard for Q1, medium in Q2, and finishing on soft tyres for the final top ten pole shoot-out round.
With the disruption to his qualifying, and a limited number of tyres available this week under the Alternative Tyre Allocation format, Perez admitted that it had left him with some hard work on his hands.
"It's quite tricky, especially if you have an issue like I did: you go completely blind. The first time you run the soft tyres is in Q3, and you are always a step behind."
But despite the setbacks, starting from P5 means he still has a chance of advancing onto the podium in tomorrow's race. "The further up you are the better,” he said. “I'm in the third row so hopefully I can get onto the second.
"I am optimistic that we can still show our strong pace and we will do our very best to come through the field.
"Obviously I want to make up some positions, and hopefully tomorrow we can do it. It will be crucial for us tomorrow to be able to go with the pack [at the start], not to lose any race time, not to use the tyres more than we want.”
Team boss Christian Horner noted: "Checo recovered well from missing track time in FP3 and an engine change to line up P5 makes for an exciting race tomorrow."
The big question now is whether Ferrari drivers Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc will be able to sustain their Saturday pace into a strong race performance. Perez felt suggestions Ferrari would be off the pace were wide of the mark.
"It's not what we've seen so far, but let's see tomorrow," he said. "I think it's a long race ahead."
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