The Mexican F1 driver said he needed a year off to recover mentally and that now, at Cadillac, he has regained his confidence.
Sergio Pérez has opened his heart about the difficult months he lived through at the end of his time at Red Bull. The Mexican driver described his last six months at the Austrian team as "toxic" and said he needed a year off to recover mentally before returning to Formula 1 with Cadillac in 2026: "When I left Red Bull I had to take a year off because mentally, it had been very exhausting. My last six months at Red Bull were very difficult even for me, who consider myself a mentally very strong person. They were very, very hard and I would say toxic, I really needed a break" declared Pérez.
The Mexican, who was fired from Red Bull at the end of the 2024 season after several years as Max Verstappen's teammate, acknowledged that the situation at the Austrian team affected him deeply and that the lack of confidence was one of the main problems he carried in his last months at the team: "I always knew what the problems were but a situation like that takes away your confidence and that's one of the reasons I wanted to come back" he explained.
Pérez highlighted the support he received from a Red Bull engineer at the end of his time at the team: "I remember that when I finished my time at Red Bull, an engineer told me: 'wherever you go, you are extremely fast and we all know it.' I won't say his name, but he told me: 'we all know that, wherever you go, you are one of the best, we all know it'" said the driver from Guadalajara.
The Mexican explained that the Cadillac project was what brought back his enthusiasm for competing: "When the Cadillac project came up, I thought: it's a huge project, it's a huge brand and when I met Dan (Towriss, the team's CEO) I saw his commitment, I know he's a very competitive person and that he will do whatever it takes to take the team to a very high level. I felt that it could also be my project, that I could be part of it," said Pérez.
The Mexican driver has regained his confidence at Cadillac and trusts that the team can take a step forward in the second half of the season. Pérez has shown solid performance in recent races, completing the tests at Silverstone and Austria and getting closer to the points zone.
The Mexican hopes that Belgium will be the scene of Cadillac's first point in Formula 1 history.
