Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez shared a quiet reunion in 2025 — and a classy one. During Checo’s sabbatical year, the former Red Bull teammates swapped helmets, with Verstappen scrawling a neat message across the visor: “Thank you for being a great teammate and friend.”
It’s a small moment, sure, but a telling one. For four seasons from 2021 to 2024, Verstappen and Perez formed F1’s most scrutinised pairing. Verstappen ran off four consecutive titles in that stretch, while Perez stacked up six career wins, the vast majority in Red Bull colours, and no shortage of critical teamwork when the titles were on the line. When the partnership ended at the close of 2024, it felt abrupt. This helmet exchange adds the punctuation mark that was missing.
Perez, who sat out the 2025 campaign, heads back to the grid next year with the incoming Cadillac outfit. He’ll be alongside Valtteri Bottas, a 10-time grand prix winner and, on paper, half of the most experienced lineup of the 2026 field. Checo wasted little time getting his hands dirty: as reported at the end of last year, he turned laps at Imola in a black-liveried 2023 car supplied by Ferrari, Cadillac’s engine partner, to kick off the first real-world running for the project.
On social media to ring in the new year, Perez posted the helmet-swap photo with a caption that sounded very Checo: “2025 sabbatical you went very fast. Let’s go for a great 2026.” He’s been consistent about the motivation for this comeback. In August he told reporters he wasn’t returning to prove anything after Red Bull, pointing to the struggles of those who followed him into the senior seat and calling the role “a very unique challenge” mentally. “I want to enjoy the sport,” he said. “I couldn’t afford to leave the way I left.”
Red Bull’s 2025, without Perez as Verstappen’s foil, turned awkward. Liam Lawson got the call but lasted just two races, shuffled back to Racing Bulls after failing to escape Q1 in Australia and China. Yuki Tsunoda took on the heavy lifting, scoring in seven of his 22 starts with a best finish of sixth in Baku, but never reached the podium. For 2026 he’s set to pivot to a test-and-reserve role, while Isack Hadjar became the latest name tried on for size after Perez’s exit. However you rate Red Bull’s driver conveyor belt, that’s not the sort of churn a title operation likes to see.
It’s why this Verstappen-Perez exchange resonates beyond the photo. In a sport that can chew through relationships as quickly as it burns tyres, this reads like mutual respect preserved. Verstappen’s message was understated yet generous. Perez’s reply had the feel of someone who’s taken stock, found his footing, and circled the date for his second act.
What comes next is anybody’s guess. Cadillac arrives with big ambitions, a heavyweight brand and, crucially, a pair of veterans who know how to lead a project. Bottas brings a calm, clinical benchmark; Perez brings racecraft and a deep memory bank of how a front-running team actually functions week-to-week. The test at Imola was a tease. The real work starts when 2026 machinery hits the ground.
As for Verstappen, the standard remains the standard. The four-time world champion has spent the last few years redefining the sport’s centre of gravity, and he’s shown little interest in anything other than keeping it that way. Helmet swaps don’t change the lap times, but in F1 they do tell you something about the people underneath. In this case, they tell you two drivers who fought the same battles from the same garage left with their respect intact — and one of them is about to try to drag a brand-new team into the fight.
