McLaren told the F1 2026 deal they should make happen for Alex Dunne

McLaren should be looking to place Alex Dunne at the new Cadillac F1 team for the F1 2026 season after his impressive showing in Austrian Grand Prix practice.

That is the claim of Karun Chandhok, the former Formula 1 driver and Sky F1 pundit, who believes the team should explore a deal including a potential recall option.

Alex Dunne identified as ideal Cadillac F1 2026 candidate after McLaren debut

Dunne, the current leader of the F2 feeder series, made his first appearance on an official F1 race weekend on Friday in Austria where he drove Lando Norris’s car in FP1.

The Irish driver showed an impressive turn of speed and set the fourth-fastest time of the session, within a tenth of team-mate and F1 2025 championship leader Oscar Piastri.

With Dunne emerging as one of the brightest talents outside of F1 currently, and Piastri and Norris both under long-term contracts, Chandhok has urged McLaren to find an F1 2026 race seat elsewhere for the teenager.

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And he has identified the incoming Cadillac F1 squad, which will become the 11th team on the grid next season, as a potential destination.

Appearing on Sky F1’s coverage of FP1 in Austria, Chandhok said: “If I was McLaren now, I’d be trying to do a deal with Cadillac or someone like that, just based on everything he’s potentially shown.

“He’s the leader of the F2 championship and they’ve seen potential in testing. We are seeing it publicly today, they’ve [already] seen it.

“You want to find him a seat somewhere to build up some racing experience.

“Honestly, I’d be trying to get him a deal somewhere else for a period of time and just farm him out.

“Have him on some sort of tether that they can pull him back in – in a way that Mercedes have done in the past with George Russell, for example.

“If I was McLaren, I’d be trying to get him a race seat somewhere.”

On Dunne’s showing in FP1 at the Red Bull Ring, he added: “Horrendously impressive performance, to be honest.

“Really, really strong. He’s just a really mature young man.

“I started to think in that session I met him at Thruxton when he was racing in British F4, and he went on to win the championship, and I remember just even in that conversation in his first year of car racing, I thought: ‘What a mature head on young shoulders.’

“That’s grown. I’m fascinated now to see what he does when he gets back in the F2 car.”

Cadillac F1’s search for drivers is expected to ramp up in the coming weeks as the team’s highly anticipated F1 2026 debut approaches.

Having initially aired a desire to pair an experienced F1 driver with an emerging talent from the United States, it has been speculated that the team could opt for two experienced racers for its first season on the grid.

Valtteri Bottas, the 10-time race winner and current Mercedes reserve driver, fuelled rumours of a move to Cadillac F1 this week with a post on social media.

In April, meanwhile, it was claimed that former Red Bull driver Sergio Perez was in ‘advanced talks’ with Cadillac F1 over an F1 2026 comeback.

Bottas’s former Sauber team-mate Guanyu Zhou has also been frequently mentioned as a potential contender to race for Cadillac.

The Chinese driver, who brings significant sponsorship, is known to have a close relationship with Cadillac F1 team principal Graeme Lowdon, with the 26-year-old currently serving as Ferrari’s reserve driver.

Cadillac will compete with Ferrari customer engines and gearboxes until at least the end of the 2028 season having agreed a technical partnership with the Italian team last December.