Colton Herta gets a sixth FP1 in Brazil, 24 laps from his F1 Super Licence
Cadillac will put Colton Herta in Sergio Pérez's car for first practice at Interlagos. Complete 24 laps and he reaches the 40 Super Licence points he needs to race in F1. How he ended up one short, and what it means for Valtteri Bottas's seat.
Colton Herta gets another shot at the one point he’s missing. Cadillac will put him in Sergio Pérez’s car for first practice at the São Paulo Grand Prix, and if he completes 24 laps of Interlagos, he reaches the 40 points he needs for an F1 Super Licence.
It will be his sixth FP1 of the season. Teams only have to run a rookie in four.
“I’m really looking forward to getting back behind the wheel of the MAC-26 for another FP1 session,” Herta said. “Interlagos is such an iconic, historic track, and driving an F1 car around there is going to be an awesome experience.”
The session starts at 12:30 local time (15:30 GMT) on Friday 6 November.
How he ended up one short
This was supposed to be done already. Cadillac ran Herta in FP1 in Mexico last week believing it would get him over the line, and he did the distance. Then the FIA said he was still one short.
“I was literally walking to go do the media stuff [after FP2], that was like the first time I had heard about it,” he said.
The cause was a mistake on IndyCar’s website. It listed Herta sixth in the 2025 championship, level on points with Felix Rosenqvist, when Rosenqvist should have been ahead for scoring more second places. Cadillac had checked its numbers with the FIA in July, but they were based on those wrong results. A reporter told IndyCar about the error last week and the site was changed.
It matters because sixth is worth six Super Licence points and seventh is worth four. The FIA has confirmed he was seventh, which leaves him here:
| Where the points came from | Points |
|---|---|
| 2023 IndyCar, 10th | 1 |
| 2024 IndyCar, 2nd | 30 |
| 2025 IndyCar, 7th | 4 |
| 2026 F1 practice: Barcelona, Budapest, Austin, Mexico City | 4 |
| Total | 39 |
One name is missing from that list. Herta also drove in FP1 at Monza in September, but a hydraulic problem stopped him after five laps, so it didn’t count. Without that failure, he’d already be on 40.
24 laps, if the car behaves
The rule gives a driver one extra point per F1 event for completing at least 100 km in a practice session, as long as he picks up no penalty points. At Interlagos, 100 km means 24 laps of a 60-minute session.
That’s normal FP1 mileage, but Cadillac’s reliability is the worry. Bottas crashed out of the Mexico race at high speed after a front-left suspension failure. Team boss Marcin Budkowski says the team has “implemented mitigations going forward”.
If Friday goes wrong, it isn’t the end. Las Vegas is another option later this month.
Herta’s own target sounds simple enough. “My goal for Friday morning in Brazil is the same: execute the run plan cleanly, give Checo and the engineers the best possible setup data to start their weekend, and keep building on my progress in the car,” he said.
What it means for Bottas
Reaching 40 doesn’t give Herta a seat, or even a licence. It only lets him apply for one. But it does give Cadillac a real choice for 2027. Pérez is signed until 2029, so the only seat in question is Bottas’s.
Valtteri Bottas talks to the media at the 2026 Chinese Grand Prix. Photo: Wan Mikhail Roslan/ZUMA Press
Bottas is on what’s understood to be a one-plus-one deal, with the second year optional, and he says he’s “pretty confident” of staying. “That’s what it reads on the paper, so that’s why I’m pretty confident,” he said. “I think everything just needs to be validated with the big bosses in the USA.”
He’s also behind Pérez 15-9 in their qualifying head-to-head, which is why the question keeps coming up.
Herta doesn’t have an easy case either. In Mexico his best lap was 0.970s slower than Pérez’s, and his long run was around eight tenths slower, though nobody outside the team knows the fuel loads. His F2 season has brought no podiums. Asked if he’s a realistic contender for the seat, he said: “I hope so. I don’t know why I’d be doing this [otherwise].”
Two more things could change the picture:
- It isn’t now or never. Herta’s 30 points from 2024 will expire at some point, but once he’s been granted a licence, Cadillac get a three-year window. In that time he can get it back with one more 100 km practice run, without needing 40 points again. So Cadillac could keep Bottas for 2027 without closing the door on Herta.
- The owners might change. TWG Global, which controls the team, is reportedly looking to sell its stake for about $3 billion, with as many as seven parties interested. Cadillac declined to comment, and TWG has previously said it’s “not considering exiting”. A new controlling owner might care less about having an American in the car.
Our view
Friday’s point should be a formality, unless the car breaks again. A team doesn’t hand out a sixth practice session when it only has to run four unless it really wants this licence done.
That still doesn’t make Herta ready. We said last week he’s the favourite for 2027 once the licence comes through, and we still lean that way, because an American driver suits an American team. But about a second off Pérez in Mexico and no F2 podiums is a thin case on pace alone. The 24 laps are the easy part. Convincing Cadillac he’s better than a 10-time Grand Prix winner is the hard part.
The São Paulo Grand Prix is on Sunday 8 November. Going? Our São Paulo F1 circuit guide has the interactive map and how to get to Interlagos.
