{"id":17752,"date":"2025-08-29T09:04:03","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T09:04:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=17752"},"modified":"2025-08-29T09:04:03","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T09:04:03","slug":"verstappen-happy-to-see-old-teammate-perez-returning-to-f1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=17752","title":{"rendered":"Verstappen happy to see old teammate Perez returning to F1"},"content":{"rendered":"
Max Verstappen congratulated former Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez as soon as he heard the Mexican had secured a Formula One comeback with newcomers Cadillac next season, he revealed on Thursday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Perez partnered the four-times world champion at Red Bull from 2021 to 2024 but left after a dramatic drop in form.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 35-year-old’s return, alongside Valtteri Bottas, with the 2026 debutants was announced on Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I quickly, when I saw the news come out, sent a message to him,” Verstappen told reporters ahead of his home Dutch Grand Prix.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I’m of course very happy for him that he got a seat. He’s a great guy and we’ve always got along very well. I’m happy to see him back on the grid. “How he’s going to perform, I think, will also depend on how good the car is going to be… but it’s a new opportunity and I’m sure he’s very excited for it.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Perez, a six-times race winner, was championship runner-up to Verstappen in 2023 but slumped to eighth in 2024 when his teammate clinched his fourth title in a row. His successors Liam Lawson, who lasted two races, and Yuki Tsunoda have also struggled in a team where Verstappen is the clear number one and the car tuned to his taste.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since Perez left, Verstappen has won two races and scored 187 points, but his teammates only adding seven with Tsunoda having a best result of sixth in the Miami sprint and ninth in regular grands prix. Verstappen said Perez now had the chance to make a fresh start with the sport’s 11th team.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I think also from his side, just one half of the season doesn’t define what you can do, right? I think he’s also quite easy in that. Some people maybe dwell on it a bit more,” he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“He has shown a lot of great things even before he got to Red Bull, during the Red Bull time. He just needs to go in there and enjoy it again and have a good time.”\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Max Verstappen congratulated former Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez as soon as he heard the Mexican had secured a Formula One comeback with newcomers Cadillac next season, he revealed on Thursday.\u00a0 Perez partnered the four-times world champion at Red Bull from 2021 to 2024 but left after a dramatic drop in form.\u00a0 The 35-year-old’s return, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}