Perez had no answer for Verstappen's 'tremendous' Miami GP pace

Sergio Perez has blamed poor tyre wear for the reason why he was unable to challenge Max Verstappen in the closing stages for the Miami Grand Prix win.

Red Bull put the Mexican on the fastest strategy, but poor tyre wear midway through the race on the Hard tyres prevented him from being able to defend the lead from Verstappen, who pitted late for Mediums.

"I gave it all. I think the first stint was really poor with the graining that we had on that initial pace and that compromised our race quite a lot, because we didn't have too much of a defence on tyres," he said.

Perez: Mediums really poor

Perez finished the race 5.3 seconds behind Verstappen, which was the predicted gap he would have once Verstappen pitted.

But he ultimately made a mistake while the pair were trading fastest laps by running wide at Turn 7, causing him to lose the advantage he built up by pitting earlier.

"The Medium initially was really poor, it was unexpected and I think that really compromised our race and in all honesty I think also Max had tremendous pace," he explained.

"I've got to analyse what went wrong today, because we simply didn't have the pace."