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Cadillac 'feeling emotional' after taking 'big step' with F1 paddock arrival
Cadillac team principal Graeme Lowdon insisted it was acceptable
for the outfit to "feel the emotion" of finally entering the F1
paddock, in what is the next "big step" for the American outfit.
This week's five-day test in Barcelona has represented Cadillac's
first time in the F1 paddock as a team on the grid, with both
Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez having driven on Monday. Bottas
drove Cadillac's 2026 car on Monday morning, before Perez took over
for the first afternoon session of the week. Both drivers confirmed
that issues were experienced, something Cadillac is not concerned
about and deems perfectly natural for a brand-new F1 team. Simply
making Barcelona represents an extraordinary achievement, having
only received the green light to become the 11th outfit in the
paddock in the opening months of last year. In less than 12 months,
Cadillac has gone from not even being an F1 team to successfully
running in the first pre-season test, something Lowdon is immensely
proud of. Discussing Cadillac officially being in the F1 paddock,
Lowdon told F1TV : "Yeah, it is a big step, and it's okay to allow
ourselves a tiny little bit of time to feel the emotion. But I
think the overriding feeling is that it feels like business as
usual, as a proper Formula 1 team. "And we're getting stuck into
the same work that everybody else is. And, you know, huge, huge,
huge respect to everybody in the team. "I'm so lucky to be in this
situation where I can work with so many really talented people,
both here at the track, back at Silverstone, back in Indianapolis,
and in Charlotte as well. "And it's a great feeling to be really
feeling as if we're on our way now."
