Red Bull team principal Christian Horner stated that he hopes that Sergio Perez's gutsy third place at the Turkish Grand Prix will help give the Mexican a confidence booster for the final six races of the season.

After eight races away from the rostrum, Perez drove a stellar race in difficult conditions to finish third, with the Mexican helping out team leader Max Verstappen by holding off Lewis Hamilton in the second half of the race despite being pushed into the pitlane entry by the reigning World champion.

Horner praised Perez's defence in a post-race interview, arguing that his return to the podium will be a significant confidence booster for the Mexican after a difficult start to the second half of the season.

"His defence with Lewis was exactly what we would expect and he very much deserved to be on the podium. He had good pace in the race, managed the tyres well so very pleased with his performance. I think he has had a bit of bad luck in recent races. Monza, he should have been on the podium, he paid the penalty for track limits there."

"Sochi, he should have been on the podium again there and elected to stay out one extra lap and that was expensive. So it had been coming for a little while and this is a great shot of confidence for him as we are now approaching the very important part of the championship."

Despite over ten years in Formula 1, Perez has admitted that it's been a challenging task being Verstappen's teammate this season, praising the Dutchman's strong mentality in an interview with Racefans.

"It's not easy being Max's teammate because he's at one with the car, he's really delivering at a very high level, we've got a unique car in a way, and it hasn't been easy, there's no secret about it, but you need to be mentally very strong after each day, and I think that's one of my strengths, to take the most out of it and try to get the maximum out of every Sunday."

"It's obviously a very good package and a very competitive one and Max is showing that this car is, if not the best, one of the best out there, I think he has done the least mistakes of anyone out there, he's put things together at a very high level. The season, it's still very long so we'll see later on, so far I have been surprised in a very positive way on how he delivers without mistakes at such a high level."