Just over a full year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's most recent entry for 2026. Building the team from scratch has involved a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac are aware the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the championship to be staged in the America, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent team in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its center ever since and enjoys a amused expression when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get a brief moment looking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in less than three years,’” he notes. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
Chester achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the task of launching the all-American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to transform cultural approach.”
With every day that goes by focus are sharper on the looming critical moment in Australia and targets are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he believed the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So we show up and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the circuit. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Effort
In late summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to stay at the back. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we won't be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to hit the goal of 600 members quickly. Complementing their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of building an main base at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are building the facility to produce the new engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, different from the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester alluded.
NASA Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” stated Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how difficult it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure similar to that of NASA's, where there were a range of specialist groups all tackling distinct elements of the project at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they report it to their team leader, that supervisor communicates with a manager somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Eliminating management approval for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this nimble methodology will be proven in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
