The Cadillac Formula 1 team has set its 2026 lineup, hiring veterans Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez to fill its first-ever open seats. Both drivers built their names at smaller teams, both drivers became race winners as teammate to world champions, and now both drivers will be tasked with building the program from an upstart to something worthy of the lofty ambitions General Motors and TWG Motorsports have for the team.
For Perez, that challenge is the appeal. In a roundtable discussion with media on Tuesday, the former Red Bull and Force India driver said that this was a constant in his conversations with Cadillac.
"The more I was talking to the Cadillac team," Perez said, "the more it became apparent that this is what excites me. It's the project itself, not just going back to the grid with a regular team to fight for podiums, races, and points. This is a whole project. The dynamic, I feel, is different."
Perez joins the team after eight months outside of the sport. After that time away, he feels that he has a better understanding of what he wants out of his relationship with auto racing. That means taking joys in progress, not just in conventional success.
"For me," Perez added, "the main thing I'm here for is to make progress with the team and to enjoy the ride. This point in my career, one trophy more, one trophy less is irrelevant. I want to enjoy the ride, get the best every single weekend. If I'm able to do that for 24 weekends, I will be pretty happy."
While Perez has been away, Bottas has been serving as a reserve driver for the Mercedes AMG F1 team that he won ten races with from 2017 to 2021. That job has kept him limited in time he can spend with the developing Cadillac team at the moment, but he knows that this is going to be a team development role as much as it is a racing one. With that in mind, he has set his 2026 expectations relatively low.
"It's a bit like when I joined from Mercedes to Alfa," Bottas says. "I kind of had to reset the goals. I've kind of done that process already in my head. [Team principal Graeme Lowdon has] always made sure that [we know] it's not going to be an easy road from the first year, it's going to be difficult. I've signed up for this, I know what to expect. Always, mentally, prepare for the worst is better. Because then whatever you achieve is positive and more rewarding... It's all about managing the expectations and working hard. The rewards will come. That's what I'm excited for and that's why I'm here."
With the team's March 2026 debut now just over six months away, team principal Graeme Lowdon says that the program is working together on simulated races to start getting into the flow of operating as a team.
"We are already simulating race events," Lowdon says. "The next one that we're doing is Monza, we simulate it as if it was a complete race weekend from start to finish, with full integration from everybody in the team. From Thursday all the way through to Sunday. We've got a very clear plan in our build-up to Melbourne next year, and it doesn't involve just simulating races. Which is really, really important. The last one we simulated, we probably had 50 or 60 engineering people fully involved over the weekend both in the UK and in the US, all getting used to working with each other. We need to be in a position that, when we get to Melbourne, we're not in a position where people are hearing voices for the first time or working with each other for the first time."
While Cadillac has announced its lead drivers for the next year, the program has not announced a reserve or any specifics on a young driver program to develop new talent. Since both Bottas and Perez will be 36 next season, the young talent behind them remains a major question. Lowdon says that the team will eventually build out that junior program, but the current focus is getting on the grid and getting up to speed.
"We've got a lot on at the minute," Lowdon adds. "We're going to be racing against some pretty good teams that we have a huge amount of respect for in a very short number of months' time. We have to go one step at a time. I've had the benefit of bringing a new team into F1 before, so I know there are various elements where drivers can really make a difference and different attributes of drivers can really make a difference. So that's one of the key reasons why we wanted to go racing with Valtteri and Checo. I think we can put together a really, really strong team here."
Lowdon notes that the team "[knows] from feedback from fans" that an American driver would be a popular hire for the team in some capacity. Although the team is not starting 2026 with an American on board, he says that it is entirely plausible in the future:
"We have consistently said that everybody in the team, drivers included, are selected on merit. We see no reason why, in the future, there can't be a U.S. driver equally selected on merit. This is Formula 1, we cannot play around. This is the pinnacle of world motorsport. As I said, I see no barrier to seeing that combination in the future."
The Cadillac F1 team makes its racing debut at next season's Australian Grand Prix. That race is on March 8th of 2026, leaving the team little time left to prepare before it faces world-class competition from the Formula 1 grid.
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