SERGIO PEREZ TRYING TO HELP HIRE LURE F1 PERSONNEL TO CADILLAC

Sergio Perez is playing recruiting sergeant for Cadillac, leveraging his paddock network to help the American outfit raid talent across the grid. The Mexican driver told Beyond the Grid he's been suggesting hires to team leadership, though he doesn't make final calls. The pitch is working: "The appetite for Cadillac around the paddock is rising every time," Perez said—a telling sign that GM's deep pockets and American ambition are turning heads in a paddock that spent years fighting to keep an 11th team out.

Perez sees General Motors' broader motorsport footprint as a competitive weapon, pointing to how McLaren borrowed ride-height tricks from its IndyCar program a few years back. Fresh thinking from Detroit could shortcut Cadillac past the usual new-team learning curve. The question now is whether Perez's connections can pull the right engineers before the established teams lock them down. If they can, his network might deliver more value than his lap times.