diff --git a/controlplane/kubeadm/controllers/upgrade.go b/controlplane/kubeadm/controllers/upgrade.go
index 81d477de2f4b..55be6292baf0 100644
--- a/controlplane/kubeadm/controllers/upgrade.go
+++ b/controlplane/kubeadm/controllers/upgrade.go
@@ -105,17 +105,12 @@ func (r *KubeadmControlPlaneReconciler) upgradeControlPlane(
 		return ctrl.Result{}, errors.Wrap(err, "failed to upgrade kubelet config map")
 	}
 
-	status, err := workloadCluster.ClusterStatus(ctx)
-	if err != nil {
-		return ctrl.Result{}, err
-	}
-
 	switch kcp.Spec.RolloutStrategy.Type {
 	case controlplanev1.RollingUpdateStrategyType:
 		// RolloutStrategy is currently defaulted and validated to be RollingUpdate
 		// We can ignore MaxUnavailable because we are enforcing health checks before we get here.
 		maxNodes := *kcp.Spec.Replicas + int32(kcp.Spec.RolloutStrategy.RollingUpdate.MaxSurge.IntValue())
-		if status.Nodes < maxNodes {
+		if int32(controlPlane.Machines.Len()) < maxNodes {
 			// scaleUp ensures that we don't continue scaling up while waiting for Machines to have NodeRefs
 			return r.scaleUpControlPlane(ctx, cluster, kcp, controlPlane)
 		}