Max Verstappen sends message to Sergio Perez as surprise reunion emerges
Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen were Red Bull teammates for four seasons between 2021 and 2024
Max Verstappen reunited with former Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez with a helmet swap during the F1 2025 season, it has emerged.
And the four-time world champion penned a special message to the new Cadillac F1 driver, thanking Perez for being “a great teammate and friend.”
Sergio Perez reunites with Max Verstappen ahead of Cadillac F1 2026 return
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Verstappen and Perez spent four seasons as Red Bull teammates between 2021 and 2024 as the former stormed to four consecutive titles.
Despite claiming all but one of his six career victories in Red Bull colours, Perez was dropped by Red Bull at the end of 2024 after a lacklustre season.
After sitting out the 2025 campaign, Perez will return to the grid in F1 2026 with the incoming Cadillac team.
He will be partnered by 10-time race winner and former Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas in the most experienced driver lineup of 2026.
As reported by PlanetF1.com, Perez carried out Cadillac’s first real-life test running at Imola in November, taking to the wheel of a black-liveried 2023 car supplied by Ferrari, Cadillac’s engine partner.
In a post to social media to mark the start of the new year, Perez revealed that he met with Verstappen during the 2025 season for an exchange of helmets.
The image shows Perez and Verstappen posing with a helmet worn by the four-time world champion at a number of races in 2024.
A message on the visor written by Verstappen reads: “Thank you for being a great teammate and friend.”
In the accompanying caption, Perez wrote: “2025 sabbatical you went very fast. Let’s go for a great 2026.”
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Red Bull struggled to adequately replace Perez in 2025 with his successors, Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda, both failing to score a podium for the Milton Keynes team.
Lawson was demoted to the Racing Bulls team after just two races having failed to progress from the first stage of qualifying in Australia and China.
Tsunoda fared only marginally better, scoring points in just seven of his 22 appearances for the senior team, recording a best finish of sixth at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku.
Tsunoda has been demoted to a test-and-reserve role for 2026 with Isack Hadjar the third driver to be signed by Red Bull since Perez’s departure was confirmed in December 2024.
The struggles of his successors was not lost on Perez, who pointed out after securing a 2026 Cadillac seat that Lawson and Tsunoda had only managed “five points in the entire season” at Red Bull.
He told PlanetF1.com and other media outlets in August 2025: “I don’t feel like there’s [anything] to prove [after leaving Red Bull].
“Not just because of the struggles of the current drivers or the next drivers that take that seat, but even before that.
“Now everyone forgets about it, but it’s been a very tricky place to be in, to constantly be adapting, to build confidence.
“Mentally, it’s a very unique challenge.
“I don’t think I have anything to prove. When you see the amount of points they [Lawson and Tsunoda] have scored, it’s [something] like five points in the entire season, so I’ve got nothing to prove in that regard.
“To me, it’s more of a coming back to enjoy the sport. I want to enjoy the sport, the sport that I love, the sport that has given me so much.
“I couldn’t afford to leave the way I left the sport.
“It’s why I’m coming back with this new project and I hope it’s a very successful one.
“But amongst that, other than anything, I want to enjoy this comeback.”
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