Cadillac chief leaves Ocon reserve-role question unanswered

Cadillac team principal Marcin Budkowski did not directly answer whether the team would discuss a reserve role with Esteban Ocon. At Friday’s FIA press conference for team representatives in Austin, he said drivers and managers on the market had contacted him, but declined to identify them or discuss Cadillac’s line-up there.

The question followed a broadcaster’s query about Sergio Pérez’s approaching 300th grand prix start. Budkowski praised Pérez’s motivation and said he was pushing Cadillac to improve, while also noting that both drivers pushed the team in their own ways. On Ocon, he spoke generally about contacts and did not confirm whether the Frenchman was among them.

The exchange came amid speculation over Cadillac’s 2027 line-up and Valtteri Bottas’s future. Both Bottas and Pérez have multi-year contracts understood to be one-plus-one deals, with the second year optional subject to conditions; the report links months of paddock gossip about Bottas’s place to a performance disparity between the teammates. The same article says an Ocon move to Cadillac is highly unlikely and that he will probably become Aston Martin’s third driver.

Cadillac’s owners want an American driver in a race seat as soon as possible, according to the report. The team ran Colton Herta in FP1 at Circuit of The Americas; he was one point short of a superlicence after a change to the FIA’s qualifying criteria, but meaningful running in another session during 2026 would qualify him. Separately, Budkowski told Sky Sports during the weekend that Cadillac was working with Herta, while stressing that the team needed the right driver at the right time.