Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc’s former race engineer Xavier Marcos Padros has been recruited by Cadillac as technical director of its LMDh sportscar undertaking. The Spanish engineer revealed some particulars of his new function to F1Technical’s senior author Balazs Szabo.
Ferrari introduced forward of final yr’s Imola F1 race that Charles Leclerc would work with a brand new race engineer. His earlier engineer Xavier Marcos stayed with the Scuderia, however moved into one other place outdoors the staff’s F1 division.
Marcos Padros began his profession in motorsport as a race engineer for the BNC Racing Crew. He acquired his first style of Formulation One whereas working for the fledging HRT staff as efficiency engineer from 2010 to 2012. After the staff folded, he joined Williams Racing as a efficiency engineer for Felipe Massa.
In search of a brand new problem, Marcos Padros determined to maneuver to the US to develop into chief race engineer for the NASCAR staff Richard Childress Racing in 2015. The Spaniard then returned to Formulation One with Scuderia Ferrari, first as a manufacturing unit primarily based race engineer for 2018 after which grew to become the race engineer for Charles Leclerc when he joined the staff in 2019, and he has remained with the five-time F1 race winner ever since.
After Ferrari had introduced that Marcos would go away its F1 division, his former efficiency engineer Bryan Bozzi began to assist Leclerc as race engineer.
It has now emerged that Marcos Padros will take up the brand new place throughout the Cadillac V-Sequence.R programme, which straddles the World Endurance Championship and the IMSA SportsCar Championship.
In his new function, the Spaniard will be part of Cadillac as its new technical director and can oversee “all points of automotive engineering, efficiency and growth.”
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Together with his new function marking the primary time that Marcos leads a whole division, Marcos defined that he must develop a a lot wider focus than in his earlier roles.
“My function inside Cadillac Racing will likely be centered on all points of engineering, automotive efficiency and growth to additional assist its FIA World Endurance Championship and IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship applications which have expanded by one automotive in every sequence for 2025.
“I’m trying ahead to working with the Cadillac Racing engineering group, groups and our chassis associate Dallara to shortly construct championship-winning applications.”
Pushed on to elucidate what abilities he can carry over from Formulation One to endurance racing, Marcos added that “motorsport has all the time pushed the boundary of automotive engineering and expertise, and I’ve been lucky to be a part of it.
“The expertise I’ve gained as a race engineer, efficiency engineer, chief race engineer throughout a number of motorsport sequence, together with F1, and the information I’ve acquired by working with many proficient and expert people over time has contributed to how I method my work and relate to folks.”
Requested whether or not his work will likely be a factory-based function, the Spanish engineer defined that he’ll journey to many of the IMSA and WEC races.
“I’ll, in my new function – and with the Rolex 24 At Daytona it’s nonetheless very new – journey to most, if not all, FIA World Endurance Championship and IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship races. Initially, it’s attending to know the personnel in each sequence on the Cadillac Racing and staff facet and from the sanctioning our bodies.
I’m trying ahead to contributing to the WEC and IMSA applications with the objective of victories and championships,” Marcos concluded.
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