Yesterday at 18:20
F1's usually engrossing silly season has been far from spectacular
this year. As the championship quickly heads towards 2026, there
have been noticeably few driver-contract stories emerging from the
paddock. Max Verstappen has pledged his loyalty to Red Bull, at
least for the first campaign with F1's latest regulations, putting
to rest the biggest rumour of recent months. However, who will
partner the Dutchman at the Milton Keynes team in 2026 remains
unclear. Will it be Yuki Tsunoda, or will the Japanese driver
leave? And should the 25-year-old lose his seat at the six-time
constructors' champions or seek pastures new of his own volition,
is Cadillac a viable option for him? The fledgling American squad
is one of the few areas of intrigue in the surprisingly static
driver market, but has yet to commit to any of its numerous
options. Tsunoda is one of the many names on the long list of
drivers available to F1's newest team, but it remains Valtteri
Bottas and Sergio Perez who are the most frequently mentioned
candidates for the General Motors-backed outfit. The question,
however, is whether Cadillac wants to go for two experienced
drivers, or rather combine youth with a known quantity. The latter
blend seems to be the more realistic approach at this stage, as it
allows the team to keep one eye on the future. Its debut year will
undoubtedly be a difficult journey into the unknown for the
American squad, and it will likely be competing towards the back of
the field. Anything more than qualifying on the last row of the
grid may well be considered a great achievement, or perhaps even a
miracle, for Cadillac in 2026. Challenges The challenges of the
2026 cars are enormous. Every team in F1 has already been clear on
this point, and that is to say nothing of how daunting that task
will be for a Cadillac as it embarks on its maiden voyage. Its
customer power unit deal with Ferrari is an advantage, as are the
external partners it has teamed up with to develop its first car,
but it is still very much in a growth phase. The team is still
growing by about 5 to 9 employees per week. These are mostly taken
away from F1 rivals, but the team members, despite their
experience, need time to bed in with a new organisation. The
structure of the team has been formed, but as with any large
entity, changes continue to take place, as is customary with the
early stages of any project of this scale. Because Cadillac was not
officially green-lighted by F1 until late in the process (March
2025), there have been delays in some areas. Given the considerable
challenges of the 2026 regulations, that has certainly not helped
the team in their path toward a successful Formula 1 debut
campaign. GM, Cadillac and the TWG group, which make up the team,
are extremely motivated to succeed in F1, but the delays incurred
are not compensable in F1. You also need time, even as a major
brand with serious resources, to get everything right. So, the lost
time to getting the official go-ahead has undoubtedly not helped
the situation; time cannot be compensated, even with the large
budget available to the new team. An associated consequence of the
slow entry process is how it has affected the team's naming of
drivers. Initially, it indicated the desire to confirm its 2026
driver line-up before the summer break. Later, this was updated to
summer break, which is now underway. Therefore, whilst there may be
updates in the coming days and weeks, there is unlikely to be
clarity imminently. Who are the main candidates? Alongside Perez,
Bottas and Tsunoda, the likes of Jak Crawford, Felipe Drugovich,
Jack Doohan and even Alex Dunne are being linked to the team, all
of whom offer youth. Assuming the team goes for Perez or Bottas at
a minimum, that still leaves a nice range of options. Will the team
dare to gamble on a rookie, such as Crawford, Drugovich, or Dunne,
or will it plump for just a little more security with a driver like
Tsunoda or Doohan? Zhou Guanyu had previously also been linked to
the team, but the 25-year-old's name is being mentioned less and
less. There is no doubt that the good results of Gabriel Bortoleto
and Nico Hulkenberg at Stake are hurting the stock of Zhou and
Bottas. Of course, there have been management changes ahead of its
transition to Audi, but it is the drivers, in particular, who
appear to be the difference makers this year for the Swiss-based F1
team. Hulkenberg is known as a driver who gives extensive feedback
to engineers, the main reason why Ayao Komatsu wanted to keep the
German at Haas, and the one-time podium finisher has, in turn,
praised Bortoleto's feedback. A small outfit like Stake underlines
the importance of not only having the right drivers but also
striking the right balance between them. The combination of
Hulkenberg and Bortoleto has helped lift the Sauber entry from the
foot of the constructors' standings to the seventh place it
currently occupies. Verstappen cited earlier this year that he
believes Perez has the right ingredients to help a young team like
Cadillac, provided the Mexican is motivated. That seems to be the
case after Perez was relieved of his duties at Red Bull by
Christian Horner, despite the newly departed team principal having
handed him a contract extension. That was not the ending to his
career that Perez had envisaged, and so the Mexican driver will be
hungry to write a new chapter in his F1 adventure. Cadillac will go
for at least one experienced driver, but who? And who will race
alongside them, another experienced hand, or an injection of youth?
With the 2026 season getting closer and closer, the time for
Cadillac to bring in its first driver is now. After that, the team
would strategically have plenty of time to bring in a second. The
question, however, is whether this is the American squad's
strategy. Either way, the new campaign is fast approaching, so
Cadillac will want to send a signal to its sponsors, and confirming
at least one of its two drivers will always do its sponsors and
shareholders good.
