Sergio Perez’s F1 career seems to be coming to an end (Image: Getty)
is reportedly heading into his final Grand Prix as a driver with looking to move on from the Mexican and replace him with either or .
Perez signed a multi-year contract extension earlier this season, but his new terms did little to boost his deteriorating performances, and after a miserable second half of the campaign, report that have made the decision to move on from the six-time Grand Prix winner.
In fact, Perez’s form has been so poor that , who Franco Colapinto suggested was the least threatening driver on the grid in an interview with sponsor Quilmes, has now outscored him four times over in the past four races, despite Sauber failing to score points in the first 22 rounds of the campaign.
“I don’t care who I have next to me [as a team-mate], whether it’s Verstappen or Zhou, I want to beat them and be ahead of them,” Colapinto said during the peak of his hype, a handful of races into his F1 career.
Sunday was simply the latest in a string of catastrophic results for Perez. His failure to match the pace of the other seven drivers in top machinery means that are locked into third place in the Constructors’ Championship standings, despite sealing the Drivers’ Championship title with two races to spare.
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Zhou Guanyu finished P8 in the Qatar Grand Prix (Image: Getty)
Horner’s comments about his incumbent driver after the Qatar Grand Prix made for worrying listening. “Checo has had a very tough year and obviously the points, the tables are what they are,” he said.
“We’re very much focused on really supporting him to the chequered flag in Abu Dhabi. It’s not an enjoyable situation for Checo being in this position with speculation every week. He’s old enough and wise enough to know what the situation is and let’s see where we are after Abu Dhabi.”
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For Perez, the future looks uncertain. Reports explain that he has been offered the same ambassadorial role that was posed, but with Cadillac joining the grid in 2026, the 34-year-old may well be fighting to get himself back into the F1 paddock.
As for Zhou, he hit back at the doubters in style, producing his best performance of the season at the Qatar GP to take the chequered flag in P8. That result equalled his career-best F1 finish and gave the struggling Sauber team their first points of a miserable 2024 season.