Just over a full year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the official approval as F1's newest entry for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from nothing has required a intense operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Australia
At the final race of the championship to be staged in the America, with just over 100 days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent team in March 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a knowing grin when considering the ride.
“You might get a brief moment looking back at what you’ve done and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Well, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of bringing the iconic American Cadillac name, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Creating an grand prix team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you don’t get the possibility to change cultural approach.”
With each passing day that goes by thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that any incoming team joining the grid is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we want to show is that we should be there,” he says. “In order that we turn up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the track. After we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their priceless expertise in competing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and we expect almost certainly a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in top gear, with employees now at over 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 members swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the midst of completing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to produce the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – until then they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the movement in F1 for greater centralisation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” stated the team principal just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of project teams all working on distinct elements of the program across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their team leader, that supervisor talks to a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to take charge. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is much smoother and quicker.”
The Future
The efficacy of this nimble approach will be tested in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their reserve driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
