Checo Pérez brought his Cadillac MAC-26 home in P14 at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku, while teammate Valtteri Bottas was forced out of the race on the final lap after a brake failure sent him into the barriers at Turn 15.

Pérez started from P20 and worked his way through the field, posting a fastest lap of 1:47.363 in what he described as one of his strongest weekends in Baku. Bottas, who started P19, had been running toward the back of the field before the late incident ended his race. His classified finishing position was P16.

“It’s been one of my strongest weekends here in Baku, in terms of performance — I’m pleased with the way I’ve driven,” Pérez said. “We were fighting cars that were one or two seconds faster than us, due to the overtake mode, and we were able to stay with them in the first stint.”

Pérez was candid about the team’s ongoing pace deficit, particularly on Baku’s long straights. “We just lack in pace and straight-line speed, we are too draggy on the straights, so then we fall back,” he said. “We don’t have any big upgrades coming in so I guess it’s going to be a tough end of the season, but we will keep on it.”

Bottas described a sequence of events that led to his retirement. A lockup into Turn 1 caused him to run wide, and he believes the car’s systems became confused by the additional distance traveled. “Then I suffered a huge super clip into Turn 15 and when I hit the brakes, only the front worked and it felt as if the rears weren’t harvesting anymore,” he said. The team confirmed it will investigate the technical issue.

Team Principal Marcin Budkowski acknowledged the disappointment while drawing positives from the weekend. “We spent most of the race fighting with other cars — especially Checo who had a really strong weekend having good battles with our rivals,” Budkowski said. “We can take encouragement from Baku as extra motivation going into Malaysia next weekend.”

The result continues Cadillac’s debut Formula 1 season, with the team focused on incremental development as it works to close the gap to the midfield.