Approximately one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for 2026. Constructing the team from scratch has entailed a intense pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As F1 descends on Vegas this weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the season finale of the campaign to be hosted in the US, with approximately three months to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are aware there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent operation in early 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center ever since and has a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.
“You can have five minutes looking back at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning seasons of 2005/2006 and was in control of technical direction at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the task of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a works entry supported by the parent company, GM, into Formula One.
“Creating an F1 team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you rarely get the chance to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that goes by focus are more focused on the impending decisive point in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” the team principal noted this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we arrive and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the race track. When we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In late summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I am confident given this organization, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To that end hiring has been in top gear, with employees now reaching more than 400 and planned to attain the goal of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the team are in the phase of building an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex structure, contrary to the direction in F1 for increased consolidation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester referred to.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on various components of the mission at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that supervisor consults a supervisor somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” says Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable people to take charge. Moving away from management approval for everything is much smoother and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this agile methodology will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
