Perez: Clash with Sirotkin looked worse from the outside

Sergio Perez believes his collision with Sergey Sirotkin during the Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix “looked worse from the outside”.

The Force India driver was slapped with a drive-through penalty for clashing with Sirotkin Singapore as the pair battled for position on Lap 27 in Singapore.

Perez accepted the blame and subsequent penalty for the incident, adding visibility played a role in the coming together after admitting he “lost the reference” point and misjudged the move.

“I’ve obviously seen it, and in my opinion, it looks a lot worse from the outside,” Perez said ahead of this weekend’s Russian Grand Prix. “With these mirrors, it’s very hard to see behind, so I lost the reference.

“I thought I already did the move on the first corner, and I was speaking on the radio at the point that I saw him, and then I just misjudged where he was.

“I was trying to close the door before braking, but he was just too close. It was just my fault. I got the penalty which I think was quite right.

“Nothing to say really other than accepting my mistake.”

The Mexican appeared to turn into the path of Sirotkin but stressed there was no intent behind the collision.

“It’s the way it looked from the outside, but I ruined my race. I wouldn’t have done it on purpose. That’s it,” Perez explained.

“When you do something wrong, you have to just accept the criticism and just look forward.”

Perez explained his radio message during the race where he complained to F1 race director Charlie Whiting about the standard of Sirotkin’s driving, though he does not feel the need to bring up the subject in the next drivers’ briefing on Friday.

“I was complaining to Charlie because he was moving quite a lot under braking, which is not ideal,” he said.

“It can cause collisions when you’re moving under braking, but I think it was a bit too much moving under braking at the time, but that has nothing to do with the incident.

“The incident was not his fault, it was my fault. But he was moving a bit too much under braking.

“I’m cool with him,” Perez added. “I think he did a good race. He defended, as I said, the only point that I have to make is that he moved a bit too much under braking on a couple of occasions.”