Perez warns Cadillac after Canada suspension failure

Sergio Perez has urged Cadillac to uncover the cause of the front-right suspension failure that ended his Canadian Grand Prix, saying an unexplained break with no wall contact was another sign the team is not converting its improving pace into results.

Perez said the problem developed on the run to pit entry before the suspension finally gave way, forcing him to retire after he had fought back from an early strategic mistake. Speaking to the media, including RacingNews365, and to Crash.net, he described it as a "straight failure" and said: "It’s something we need to investigate, understand, and hopefully get on top of, because it’s not ideal what happened."

The failure was especially alarming because Perez said there had been no contact to trigger it. As he headed toward the pits, the car became unbalanced through the steering, and the front-right suspension then collapsed, scattering carbon fiber at pit entry and ending his race.

That came after Cadillac had already put itself on the back foot by starting Perez on intermediate tyres in conditions that quickly swung toward slicks. Perez said the choice felt finely balanced on the laps to the grid, but the call went wrong almost immediately once the race began. "It was honestly 50:50 at that point," he said. "It became a lot clearer that we were on the wrong tyre very early on. Within three laps, we killed them, and that was the biggest issue there."

Even so, Perez said Cadillac had recovered enough to make the retirement more frustrating. He was running 16th, ahead of team-mate Valtteri Bottas and battling Esteban Ocon’s Haas, with Perez saying the car had shown "some good pace out there" and that he had enjoyed "some good fights with the Haas" before overtaking Ocon.

That is why Perez’s criticism extended beyond the suspension break itself. He said Cadillac is improving on raw performance, but not quickly enough on execution. "Operationally, we are still lacking a lot," Perez said, adding that the team is "in a massive hurry, because we are not maximising the results."

The missed opportunity stung even more because Perez called Canada Cadillac’s most competitive weekend since the start of the season. Instead, the team left Montreal without a point, with Bottas finishing 16th and last of the classified runners, underlining Perez’s view that Cadillac must fix its operational weaknesses if it is to capitalize on the progress in the car.