Cadillac drivers Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez say the team must now pile downforce onto its Formula 1 car after working through various teething issues.
Having joined F1 this year as an 11th team, the month of March was one of firsts for Cadillac, with its first start and finish in Australia, which was also its first opportunity to run two cars concurrently.
Both Perez and Bottas subsequently made it to the finish in China and Japan, and with most of the team's early reliability problems, such as a lingering fuel pump issue, out of the way, the team is now shifting its focus on finding performance.
Suzuka qualifying showed the team is lagging around 1.2 seconds behind the bottom of the midfield, a more than respectable result given the team's infancy. But having already introduced minor upgrades in Japan, Perez is hoping the team's Miami upgrade next month will deliver a much bigger step.
"When I was racing the Williams, the Alpine, I could see that they're not too far away, they're just able to consistently keep finding pace and pace," Perez reported. "It's clear that we need a second now and I really hope that we are bringing a big upgrade for Miami. That will be the biggest test for the team."
"I think we've been progressing every grand prix, this is the first grand prix that more or less everything has been straightforward. So, I really hope that we can make that step to be in the mix with the midfield.
"I think there's a lot of areas, but I think at the moment the main one is load, it's where we are lacking the most. Balance itself is not too bad, it's just that we are lacking the load."
Bottas agreed that downforce has been the biggest area Cadillac is lacking after the US-owned team debuted a relatively basic launch car, focusing on cleaning up its trackside operations first.
"I feel we've gained a bit of load, a bit of stability," Bottas said about the team's modest Japan update, a slightly re-profiled diffuser. "It worked as expected. We gained a bit of load, especially on the rear end, and hopefully a bigger step in Miami. We're still lacking a lot compared to the top teams, but at least the direction is right.
"Even though we're lacking load, some of the driveability, the balance of the car is in a decent window from the get-go. So, all the fundamentals are there to make good steps. There's a lot in the pipeline, which is good. The break in April is probably going to help us a little more just to prioritise certain things and hopefully bring some of the upgrades forward."
