Just over a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the official approval as Formula One’s latest entrant for 2026. Constructing the organization from the ground up has involved a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the championship to be held in the America, with approximately 100 days to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are cognizant there will never be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent project in early 2023 shortly after it was created, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a wry smile when considering the ride.
“You can have a short period thinking back at what you’ve done and say: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we’ve done in less than three years,’” Chester states. “But then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Challenge
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical development at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has been quite like the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the parent company, General Motors, into F1.
“Creating an Formula One team from the ground up, 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 transform team culture.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation executing the correct procedures on the race track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for the 2026 season, a duo remarkable for their invaluable experience in performing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We have a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I am confident with this setup, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now reaching over 400 and planned to hit the objective of 600 swiftly. In addition to their present headquarters at the UK base, the organization are in the phase of completing an headquarters at Fishers in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, different from the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred.
Space Mission Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said the team principal just before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we understand how difficult it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a decentralized management akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all tackling various components of the mission across a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader communicates with a manager somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” says Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is much smoother and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible methodology will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
