Approximately one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the green light as Formula One’s newest participant for 2026. Building the squad from scratch has involved a intense operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the final race of the championship to be staged in the America, with approximately a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural 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 endeavor, they are aware there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was created, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a wry smile when reflecting on the journey.
“You might get five minutes reflecting at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in less than three years,’” he says. “Then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has truly matched the task of introducing the all-American Cadillac name, a works entry sponsored by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to alter cultural approach.”
With every day that passes thoughts are more focused on the impending moment of truth in Melbourne and targets are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad coming in is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we turn up and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation executing the right things on the track. When we prove that we’re really credible, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Effort
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a tandem remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to stay at the back. I am confident with this setup, with this team, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with personnel now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to reach the target of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the midst of finishing an headquarters at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the center to produce the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, different from the movement in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
NASA Model
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon shortly before the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. OK, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a decentralized management akin to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all focusing on distinct elements of the program in a different facilities.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader consults a manager in another department, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” says Chester. “So we empower people to handle things directly. Moving away from hierarchical consent for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The efficacy of this flexible strategy will be proven in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
