Approximately twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the go-ahead as F1's latest participant for 2026. Constructing the squad from nothing has involved a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the America, with around a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic team in March 2023 soon after it was created, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“There might be five minutes looking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he says. “But then the next minute you think: ‘Yeah, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
Nick Chester had success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious seasons of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the task of introducing the all-American Cadillac brand, a factory team supported by the owner, General Motors, into F1.
“Building an grand prix team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you won't have the opportunity to transform cultural approach.”
With each day that elapses minds are more focused on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and expectations are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any new team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Lowdon commented this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “In order that we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation doing the correct procedures on the track. After we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a tandem distinguished for their priceless expertise in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas expressed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. In my view with this structure, with this team, this staff, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now reaching in excess of 400 and intended to reach the objective of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their present headquarters at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the midst of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are building the center to produce the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organization, different from the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” said Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all working on different aspects of the project in a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a protocol where someone has a problem and they report it to their supervisor, that leader communicates with a leader in another department, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Avoiding management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and quicker.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
