Approximately one year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately given the go-ahead as Formula One’s most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from nothing has involved a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the season to be staged in the US, with just over three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are cognizant there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart from that point and enjoys a knowing grin when considering the journey.
“You can have a short period reflecting at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you think: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Nick Chester achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's championship-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the task of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors, into F1.
“Building an grand prix team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the opportunity to change cultural approach.”
With every day that goes by thoughts are more focused on the approaching moment of truth in Australia and expectations are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated earlier this year and while Chester shared this view he thought the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he says. “So we arrive and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the race track. When we prove that we’re really credible, then we want to show forward movement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Push
In the summer they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I believe with this structure, with these individuals, these people, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now reaching more than 400 and planned to hit the target of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the team are in the midst of finishing an headquarters at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are constructing the facility to build the power unit, set for the 2029 season – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, different from the movement in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO alluded.
Apollo Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” said Lowdon just before the British GP in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all tackling distinct elements of the project across a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their manager, that supervisor talks to a leader at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains the CTO. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for each action is far more efficient and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this agile approach will be proven in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
