The great dream of Checo Pérez, the Mexican pilot who will race before his people

what week is coming Czech! Today he will run in Texas and next Sunday in Mexico. The stands will be his, the fists will be raised for him and his team has already made it clear that he has every intention of closing the 1-2 in the drivers’ championship. The team is willing to give him all the usual treats that he enjoys Verstappen, current two-time champion: engineers, priority on the track and privileged attention in arrests. The winged house has set the final tandem as a definition priority.

But not all is so easy. Verstappen wants to continue adding victories to establish himself as the driver with the most wins in a season. And while the Mexican, on more than one occasion, has put Max’s interests above his own, no one guarantees that this is reciprocal. Recently, the two-time champion was asked what would happen, in the hypothetical situation that he was leading the Mexico City GP and Pérez was second. Verstappen did not hesitate: “I would win because either way Checo would be scoring more points than Leclerc, who is third. As a driver I want to win.”

Although it is the expected response from someone who seeks the immortality of becoming one of the record holders, the coldness has not stopped turning on some alerts in Red Bull. Before the commotion, Checo has put some calm stating that he is sure that if the circumstances on the tracks occur, Verstappen will support him.

Behind is Ferrari who knows that the only thing left is to cling to the second place of drivers to save some dignity. Little prize for the great start to the season they had. And although it has been easy to blame the team for how Leclerc’s chances were dissolved, we must not forget that the Monegasque had unforgivable mistakes for someone called to be a protagonist: Imola’s spin chasing Pérez at a time when he was leading the championship, the mistake at Paul Ricard that allowed Max to widen his distance in the classification and, finally, the failed braking in the final chicane at Suzuka, which shortened the suspense of the definition.

In this context, Ferrari and Leclerc have to do something that they have not been able to do all year: string together four perfect races. No mistakes on the part of the team and no blunders on the pilot side. Will they make it? They have historical prestige but no immediate credibility. Let’s see if they have taken any lesson from this 2022.

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