Just over one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally awarded the official approval as F1's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Building the organization from nothing has entailed a hectic operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As the sport descends on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Australia
At the last event of the championship to be staged in the United States, with approximately 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in early 2023 soon after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a amused expression when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get a short period reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Well, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
The CTO achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of launching the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors, into F1.
“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you don’t get the opportunity to change team culture.”
With every day that elapses focus are increasingly concentrated on the impending critical moment in Australia and expectations are being managed.
“One must presume that any incoming team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while Chester shared this view he felt the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “So that we turn up and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team performing the correct procedures on the race track. When we prove that we’re really credible, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Effort
In late summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their priceless expertise in competing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas reflected the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to progress rapidly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To that end hiring has been in full swing, with personnel now up to in excess of 400 and planned to hit the target of 600 members swiftly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to produce the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organization, different from the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester alluded.
Apollo Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” said Graeme Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how tough it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on various components of the program at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they report it to their supervisor, that supervisor communicates with a manager in another department, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes Chester. “We give authority to team members to handle things directly. Moving away from hierarchical consent for each action is much smoother and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
