Sergio Perez revealed his surprise and delight at finishing fifth on his Red Bull debut after stopping on the formation lap and having to start from the pitlane.

The Mexican had been enduring a tough first weekend for Red Bull after only qualifying eleventh fastest after his first lap time was deleted for a breach of track limits.

Worse was to come on the formation lap when Perez's RB16B lost drive on the formation lap before his Honda power unit found power once again, and Perez was able to start the race from the pitlane.

But Perez fought back after pitting under the safety car for fresh tyres to finish in fifth place and earn the honour of being crowned driver of the day by the sport's fans.

“Considering how my race started, I think we can be pleased, “The most important of today that I was able to do the race, you know? And yesterday, I missed out in Q3. I missed a lot of mileage, so that wasn’t ideal.

“Today, I did the race, and I think I had a lot of understanding and a lot of data to go through with the engineers and a lot of work ahead of us, but we can see that things are… clicking better. Everything was feeling better in the race, so I’m pleased with that.”

 However, the Mexican had no explanation for his stoppage on the formation lap.

“I don’t know what happened. I was in the middle of the corner, and everything went off. I lost the engine, I lost ignition, I thought that that was it, and all of a sudden I started to hear Jonathan Wheatley on the radio and I was like ‘whoa’.

“This thing woke up, and I turned on the engine, and I had to start from the pitlane. A lot of work ahead of us is back in contention in the place we want to be. The positive is that the pace was good today, so we’re getting there”.