Approximately a full year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's latest entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from nothing has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the championship to be hosted in the America, with around three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart ever since and gets a knowing grin when considering the experience.
“You can have a brief moment thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in less than three years,’” Chester states. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in Alonso's championship-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in command of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you don’t get the chance to alter organizational mindset.”
With every day that goes by minds are sharper on the looming critical moment in the Australian GP 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 feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “So we arrive and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the race track. When we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on forward movement from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Push
In August they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these people, there’s no reason why we won't be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in top gear, with personnel now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to attain the objective of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the phase of completing an HQ at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are building the facility to manufacture the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex structure, at odds with the trend in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester referred.
NASA Blueprint
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” remarked the team principal shortly before the British Grand Prix in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all tackling distinct elements of the program at a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their team leader, that manager talks to a leader somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” notes Nick Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Avoiding management approval for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this flexible approach will be proven in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
