Sergio Perez came agonizingly close to scoring Cadillac’s first Formula 1 point in Monaco, only for a post-race 10-second penalty for a grid infringement to drop him from 10th to 15th and last in the classification. The result denied the American team a landmark moment in just their sixth race as F1’s first fully new entrant in a decade.
Stewards reviewed footage from the red flag restart and determined Perez was at fault for his front right wheel being positioned outside his grid box. The penalty erased what had been a remarkable recovery drive through a chaotic Monaco race that saw Max Verstappen, Lando Norris, Charles Leclerc, Ollie Bearman and Carlos Sainz all fail to finish due to crashes and mechanical failures.
“After the red flag restart, Checo drove fantastically well to make up several positions on the road — it was a real shame that the penalty dropped us back as he fought like he was going for the win,” Team Principal Graeme Lowdon said.
Perez’s afternoon was turbulent from the outset. He was penalized with a drive-through penalty early in the race after replays showed him lining up in the wrong grid box, where an empty slot should have been left following Gabriel Bortoleto’s pit lane start. Despite that setback, Perez climbed to 14th off the line, pitted for medium tires and dropped to 16th, then fell to 18th after serving his drive-through.
A late Safety Car period reshuffled the order dramatically. As retirements mounted around him, Perez was promoted up the field. He avoided the closing-lap chaos involving Nico Hulkenberg, Sainz and Franco Colapinto, overtook Fernando Alonso and gained another position when George Russell served his own drive-through penalty. Perez crossed the line in 11th and was briefly elevated to 10th when Hulkenberg received his own post-race penalty for colliding with Sainz.
The near-miss nonetheless underscores genuine progress from Cadillac across their debut season. In Melbourne, Perez finished last of the classified runners, three laps behind the leaders, while teammate Valtteri Bottas retired with mechanical problems. Both drivers were a lap down in China before Perez completed his first race on the lead lap in Suzuka. In qualifying, Perez’s deficit to the Q1 benchmark has shrunk from more than three seconds in Australia to approximately 1.5 seconds in Monaco, where his P18 matched his best single-lap result of the season.
The team still faces significant challenges. Neither car has escaped Q1 in any qualifying session, and rivals Aston Martin and Williams have continued their own development pushes. But Cadillac’s trajectory suggests the gap is closing faster than many observers anticipated heading into the season.