‘That is brutal’: Las Vegas brutally trolls Red Bull star’s ugly flop

The city of Las Vegas has brutally trolled Sergio Perez after the under-fire Red Bull driver crashed out of Q1 in another embarrassing chapter of a horror season.

Mercedes’ George Russell will start from pole ahead of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz with a shock on the second row of the grid with Alpine’s Pierre Gasly putting in a stunning lap.

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It’s pushed Charles Leclerc to the second row with drivers championship contenders Max Verstappen and Lando Norris next to each other on the third row of the grid in a mouth-watering prospect for Sunday’s race.

But the big news was Perez, who will start the Las Vegas Grand Prix from 16th on the grid.

It’s been a horrific year for the Mexican, particularly when teammate Verstappen has all but wrapped up the driver championship barring a disaster.

While Verstappen on 393 points leads Lando Norris in second by 62 points with three races still to come this season, the constructors’ is a completely different story.

With Perez in eighth in the driver standings on 151 points, he sits a massive 242 points behind his teammate, meaning Red Bull currently sits third in the standings, 49 points behind McLaren at the top, with Ferrari in second, 13 points ahead of the reigning champions.

So the last thing Perez needed was to crash out in Q1 for the fifth time this season, the eighth time this year he’s missed Q3.

There is a mountain of pressure on Perez, who inexplicably got a contract extension earlier this year, but has essentially been holding on to his seat by the skin of his teeth.

After Daniel Ricciardo was axed by Red Bull junior team VCARB earlier in the year for not forcing his way into Perez’ seat, Liam Lawson was brought in, while Red Bull have also been heavily linked with Argentinian young gun Franco Colapinto, who has impressed in his short time since replacing Logan Sargeant at Williams.

While Colapinto had a great Q1, qualifying in the top 10, he finished Q2 in the wall, qualifying 14th. But it’s inarguable that he deserves his place in F1.

With Perez needing to put his best, it was far from where he’d want to be and begs the question of when Red Bull are finally going to make the obvious call.

It was a qualifying performance so bad that even the city of Las Vegas itself trolled the 34-year-old.

After he was knocked out, the Las Vegas Sphere showed a video of Perez giving himself a thumbs down.

On the official F1 coverage as the camera flicked over to it, commentator Alex Jacques said: “That’s a bit brutal isn’t it?”

David Coulthard commented: “That was probably meant to be amusing when he filmed that.”

Jacques added: “He won’t be filming that again in the off-season will he?” before Coulthard responded: “Well, will he be filming anything in the off-season?”

And judging by this performance, the answer should be no.

Fans couldn’t help themselves when they saw the brutal graphic.

One fan said: “Displaying this graphic on the sphere after perez gets eliminated is WILD work.”

Another posted: “The sphere is even trolling lol.”

A third replied: “Perez on the sphere giving thumbs down to Perez getting cut in Q1 — I’m in tears.”

On Sky Sports, David Croft said it was “another poor poor night in qualifying for Sergio Perez”.

Martin Brundle added: “And bad news for Red Bull in the constructors’ championship as well in terms of potential to score points from that second car.”

Perez was dejected when he was told he’d missed Q2, saying on team radio: “Unbelievable. It just doesn’t get any better. I couldn’t find any grip.”

Croft said it was “sad to see” Perez so devoid of confidence.

Perez spoke to media after the session but was clearly disappointed by his performance.

“I did definitely want more today and it felt like we were making good progress, but not enough in the end,” Perez said.

“It turned out to be quite a difficult session.

“(For tomorrow) the race pace looked a lot more competitive than it did early on, so looking forward to it.”

It’ll be a fascinating race on Sunday (5pm AEDT) with the race taking part at 10pm local time in Las Vegas with cold conditions potentially set to wreak havoc with the drivers and their tyres.

And with a mixed up grid with Gasly up on the second row, there’s still plenty to race for.

It could be Ferrari’s chance to push for the constructor’s championship with Sainz on the front row and Leclerc in fourth, while McLaren’s Norris will start on the third row, with Oscar Piastri back starting in eighth.

Starting Grid for 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix

Row 1: George Russell, Mercedes — Carlos Sainz, Ferrari

Row 2: Pierre Gasly, Alpine — Charles Leclerc, Ferrari

Row 3: Max Verstappen, Red Bull — Lando Norris, McLaren

Row 4: Yuki Tsunoda, VCARB — Oscar Piastri, McLaren

Row 5: Nico Hulkenberg, Haas — Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes

Row 6: Esteban Ocon, Alpine — Kevin Magnussen, Haas

Row 7: Zhou Guanyu, Sauber — Franco Colapinto, Williams

Row 8: Liam Lawson, VCARB — Sergio Perez, Red Bull

Row 9: Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin — Alexander Albon, Williams

Row 10: Valterri Bottas, Sauber — Lance Stroll, Aston Martin