A little more than a full year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately given the official approval as Formula One’s newest participant for the 2026 season. Building the team from nothing has required a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 descends on the Vegas strip this weekend, Cadillac know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the campaign to be held in the America, with just over 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in March 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a amused expression when thinking about the experience.
“There might be a short period looking back at what you’ve done and think: ‘Amazing, how impressive what the team has created in under three years,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you think: ‘Yes, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in control of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has been quite like the task of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an grand prix team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes focus are more focused on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being managed.
“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted recently and while Chester echoed this he felt the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the track. Once we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Effort
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem notable for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We have a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe given this organization, with these individuals, these personnel, there is every reason that we can't manage to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in full swing, with personnel now at over 400 and planned to attain the goal of 600 swiftly. Alongside their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the midst of finishing an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to manufacture the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, contrary to the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked the team principal shortly before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all working on distinct elements of the project across a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a procedure where a challenge emerges and they report it to their team leader, that manager communicates with a manager in another department, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” notes the CTO. “So we empower people to take charge. Moving away from management approval for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is no little amount riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
