A little more than a full year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally granted the green light as the world of Formula One's latest participant for 2026. Establishing the team from scratch has required a intense pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As the sport converges on the Vegas strip this weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
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 maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic project in early 2023 not long after it was formed, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a amused expression when considering the experience.
“You can have five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and say: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Nick Chester had success at the Renault team in Alonso's victorious seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical development at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has been quite like the mission of bringing the all-American Cadillac name, a works entry supported by the corporate entity, General Motors, into F1.
“Creating an Formula One team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to transform team culture.”
With each day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the approaching critical moment in Australia and targets are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that any new team coming in is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while the CTO shared this view he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the circuit. After we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we will focus on progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Drive
In the summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a tandem remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I am confident with this setup, with this group, these personnel, there’s no reason why we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to hit the goal of 600 swiftly. In addition to their present headquarters at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are constructing the center to build the power unit, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organisation, at odds with the direction in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester alluded.
Space Mission Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” stated Graeme Lowdon just before the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, rather than the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of project teams all focusing on various components of the project across a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a process where a challenge emerges and they report it to their team leader, that manager communicates with a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes Chester. “We give authority to people to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for all decisions is much smoother and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this agile approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the emerging American Colton Herta
