Although Perez won two of the opening four races of the season, a qualifying slump meant by the summer break it was all over bar the shouting as he struggled to reach the podium as his team-mate Max Verstappen went on a 10-race winning streak.
Formula 1’s rumour mill was brutal as pundits and fans alike called on Red Bull to drop Perez, while Helmut Marko’s criticism of the driver did nothing to calm the situation.
Swinging through the highs and lows last season with just two wins to his team-mate’s 19, Perez admits he found it difficult to shrug off the bad moments.
“It is not like I’m bulletproof to it,” he said. “I say it easily, but I know that if I have a bad result on Sunday, I will feel it for many weeks.”
But with his biggest lesson in F1 being “not to get carried away, knowing that you are not as good as when you win, and you are not as bad as when you lose”, the father of four says having a family helps him keep it in perspective.
“As I got married in my career, as I have kids, it’s something new and something that you start to know yourself a little bit more,” Pérez said. “In the end, I find (it) really important to be able to disconnect from (F1).
