Mexican GP F1 pressure proved Perez's tranformation

The spotlight was firmly on Perez in the build up to the Mexico City event, with the 25-year-old mobbed by fans and media as F1 returned to his home country for the first time in 23 years.

Force India deputy team principal Bob Fernley feels Perez took it all in his stride, a sign of his burgeoning confidence, and another step away from his miserable year with McLaren in 2013.

"It was an amazing reflection of how Checo has developed, that he could absorb all the pressure the way he did, and calmly get on with it and deliver a result," Fernley told Autosport.

"It would be an incredible challenge for any driver to cope with the pressure he has had to cope with in his home country, and credit to him for the way he handled it.

"His confidence has been growing since he scored a podium in Bahrain last year, and you have seen the improvement since then.

"Up until that podium I think he was struggling, and still coming to terms with some of the after-effects of what he went through at McLaren.

"But that was the turning point and since then he has grown and grown in stature."

Although Perez claims his race was "destroyed" by the safety car that emerged after Sebastian Vettel buried his Ferrari in a barrier, Fernley feels what followed was another sign of his driver's talent.

Keeping Perez out, rather than pitting for a fresh set of tyres as he would have likely lost three places, forced him to run to the end on old rubber.

Although Perez was unable to attack those ahead of him, notably team-mate Nico Hulkenberg who did stop for new tyres under the safety car, he managed to keep behind him Toro Rosso's Max Verstappen and Romain Grosjean of Lotus to claim eighth.

"In essence the safety car benefited Nico because he was marginal on making it [to the end on old tyres]," added Fernley.

"To a certain degree it hurt Checo because his plan was to be able to take advantage of maybe the difficulties Nico, [Felipe] Massa and a couple of others would have had.

"But he showed how strong he was because we didn't need to change the tyres, he had plenty of pace.

"For us it was about holding him in position because we knew he had the tyres underneath him.

"He did just over 50 laps on one set, and that's one of his skills, being able to manage the tyres like that."