Perez to miss Monaco as F1 muses lucky escape

Sergio Perez will spend Sunday in hospital rather than on the streets of Monaco for the prestigious grand prix.

The Mexican rookie crashed heavily during qualifying on Saturday and was diagnosed at the local Princess Grace with concussion and a sprained thigh.

"His first words were ’I’m ok to race tomorrow’," revealed team manager Beat Zehnder.

FIA medical staff, as well as president Jean Todt, visited the Sauber driver late on Saturday.

"Perez will remain in hospital overnight and tomorrow (and) will not drive in the Monaco grand prix," confirmed FIA head of communications Matteo Bonciani.

The 21-year-old and F1 in general was on Saturday thanking its lucky stars, particularly because some drivers - including Nick Heidfeld - pleaded with Charlie Whiting after Nico Rosberg’s near-identical morning crash to make immediate changes to the run-off at the tunnel chicane.

"It was very lucky that they pulled the sleeping policemen (kerbs) because I think Sergio could have even had a nastier accident with his car potentially not having the right impact into the side," agreed Mark Webber.

Fingers were being pointed not only at a bump under braking for the Nouvelle chicane that might be worse this year than before, and the barrier division between the track and the escape road, but also the current configuration of the cars.

"For some reason it seems to be more of an issue this year because of the blown diffuser systems that a lot of us have," said Jenson Button, referring to the place at which he also crashed in a near identical crash eight years ago.