Just over one year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally awarded the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest entry for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from the ground up has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the United States, with around three months to go before they make their debut for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team in the spring of 2023 not long after it was created, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core since then and gets a knowing grin when considering the ride.
“You can have five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and say: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in less than three years,’” he notes. “Then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the mission of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, General Motors, into F1.
“Establishing an grand prix team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you rarely get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes focus are more focused on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and expectations are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” the team principal commented this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the race track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas expressed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it’s going to be most likely a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching more than 400 and intended to reach the target of six hundred quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of building an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are constructing the center to produce the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, contrary to the direction in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
Space Mission Blueprint
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo program,” remarked Lowdon ahead of the British GP in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all focusing on different aspects of the project across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that supervisor talks to a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable people to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble approach will be proven in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
