Formula 1 News: Cadillac’s Sergio Perez breaks cover in black Ferrari (Update)

We have added some additional photos by Federico Basile from today’s Cadillac testing at Imola with Sergio Perez at the wheel.

Under the crisp November sun at Imola, where the ghosts of Formula 1’s storied past lingered in every curve of the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari, Sergio Perez felt the familiar hum of anticipation coil in his chest.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

It had been a year—a sabbatical that stretched like an eternity after his turbulent farewell from Red Bull, where podiums had turned to pressures he could no longer outrun. But today, on November 13, 2025, the Mexican driver was back, not in scarlet red, but strapped into a sleek, all-black beast: a two-year-old Ferrari SF-23, its iconic halo stripped away like a secret too heavy to carry into this new chapter. The car belonged to Cadillac, the upstart American team forging its path to the 2026 grid from scratch, borrowing wheels from Maranello because their own garage echoed with empty promise—for now.

Perez adjusted his gloves, the leather creaking softly as he glanced at the pit wall. There, a ragtag crew of about 20 Cadillac personnel—engineers with fresh notebooks, mechanics wide-eyed and eager—huddled under the watchful eyes of 30 Ferrari veterans lent for the occasion. This wasn’t about shattering lap records or chasing shadows of the SF-23’s glory days; it was about rhythm, about oiling the gears of a machine built not just from carbon fiber, but from human grit. “We’re not testing the car,” team principal Graeme Lowdon had said the night before, his voice steady over dinner in a nearby trattoria. “We’re testing the people.” And Perez, with his quiet intensity, was the spark to light it all.

The engine roared to life, a guttural symphony that drowned out the doubts. As he rolled onto the track for the first of two days, the black livery gleamed like midnight armor, stripped of Ferrari’s prancing horse—no logos, no traces of old allegiances. Imola unfolded before him: the sweeping Tamburello, the tight Piratella, each corner a memory of Senna’s fire and Lauda’s resolve.

Perez pushed gently at first, feeling the chassis bite into the asphalt, the tires whispering secrets of grip long forgotten during his time away. Laps blurred into a meditative flow—installation runs, systems checks, nothing flashy. But in the background, the real race was unfolding: a mechanic fumbled with tire blankets for the first time, cursing under his breath as heat singed his fingers; an engineer scribbled furiously, syncing data streams that would one day feed Cadillac’s own hybrid heart; Lowdon paced, radio crackling with encouragement, building the muscle memory of a pit stop symphony.

By midday, the session hummed with purpose. Perez pitted, helmet off, sweat beading on his brow as he debriefed with the team. “It feels good to be back,” he admitted later, his smile cracking the stoic facade that had carried him through Red Bull’s storms. “This isn’t just driving—it’s starting something new, together.”

The Cadillac crew nodded, their faces alight with the thrill of firsts. They’d already conquered milestones off-track: a crash-test dummy had crumpled against a basic chassis prototype weeks earlier, and an experimental floor had been wind-tunneled into submission. Development raced ahead like a V6 turbo, fueled by Andretti’s relentless vision and General Motors’ deep pockets. Valtteri Bottas, Perez’s soon-to-be teammate, watched from afar—still tethered to Mercedes by contract, unable to join but already plotting their dual assault on the grid.

As the sun dipped toward the Emilia-Romagna hills, Perez climbed out for the final run, the SF-23 waiting like a loaned steed. Tomorrow would bring more laps, more fine-tuning, a dress rehearsal before Cadillac’s veiled filming day and the closed-door shakedowns in Barcelona. But in that moment, with the engine’s echo fading into twilight, Perez stood tall amid the paddock’s quiet chaos. This was no mere test; it was resurrection. From the ashes of a sabbatical, a new empire stirred—an American dream wrapped in black carbon, hurtling toward 2026 with the unyielding spirit of a driver who’d never truly quit. And as the team packed up under strings of garage lights, laughter mingling with the clank of tools, Imola whispered a promise: the grid was about to get a whole lot faster.