Perez joins Cadillac to prove he is still one of F1's best after toxic Red Bull exit

Sergio Perez has revealed that his move to Cadillac for the 2026 Formula 1 season was driven by a personal need to prove he remains “one of the best” on the grid, after describing his final six months at Red Bull as “toxic” and mentally exhausting.

Speaking on the High Performance podcast, the Mexican driver said he took a year away from the sport to recharge before the opportunity with the newly formed American outfit presented itself. The combination of the team’s ambition and the backing of General Motors persuaded him to return.

“When the project with Cadillac came, I thought, ‘This is a massive project; this is a massive brand,’” Perez explained. “And when I met Dan [Towriss], I knew this guy is very competitive, and he will do whatever it takes to take it to a very good level.”

Perez was candid about the psychological toll his difficult final period at Red Bull had taken, acknowledging that consistently being outperformed by team-mate Max Verstappen eroded his self-belief. “The period at Red Bull takes that confidence from you when you are not delivering and your team-mate is winning and so on,” he said. “I always knew what the issues were, but it takes confidence away from you. That’s why I wanted to come back.”

Now embedded in the process of building Cadillac from the ground up, Perez is under no illusions about the scale of the task ahead. The team was still in its early races at the time of the podcast recording, but he expressed confidence in the long-term direction set by its ownership structure.

“Of course, it’s very early days,” he said. “We are only on our sixth race and there is a sort of culture that is building. But I can see that the owners will not stop until they do that. You’re talking about General Motors and TWG. There are two great forces that are not going to stop until they get there.”

For Perez, the Cadillac project represents more than a career continuation — it is a chance to redefine his legacy on his own terms after a bruising end to one of the most high-profile partnerships in the paddock.