Approximately twelve months ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from the ground up has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As F1 descends on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the final race of the campaign to be held in the America, with just over a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic operation in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“You can have five minutes thinking back at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in under three years,’” he says. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yeah, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO achieved victories at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious years of 2005/2006 and was in control of technical development at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an F1 team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you don’t get the chance to change cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses minds are sharper on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and targets are being handled.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is going to be last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” the team principal noted recently and while Chester echoed this he believed the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So we show up and we perform competently. We want to show that we’re a proper team executing the proper actions on the track. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement after that.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In late summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in competing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Bottas expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he said. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to stay at the back. I believe with this structure, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end hiring has been in top gear, with staff now at in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 members quickly. In addition to their existing facility at the UK base, the organization are in the phase of finishing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to produce the power unit, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will run Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the movement in Formula One for more centralization, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred.
Space Mission Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we know how difficult it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, as opposed to the conventional chain of command, a decentralized management akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all working on different aspects of the project across a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a process where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their manager, that leader talks to a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” says Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable people to really get on with it. Moving away from managerial sign-off for all decisions is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a considerable amount on the line for F1, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
