A little more than a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately given the green light as F1's most recent entrant for 2026. Establishing the squad from the ground up has involved a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac are aware the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the United States, with just over a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in the spring of 2023 soon after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a knowing grin when considering the journey.
“You can have five minutes thinking back at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in under three years,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you realize: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical development at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has been quite like the task of launching the all-American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you rarely get the opportunity to alter team culture.”
With each day that goes by thoughts are sharper on the impending critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being handled.
“One must presume that any incoming team joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while Chester shared this view he felt the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we function efficiently. We want to show that this is a professional operation executing the correct procedures on the race track. Once we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we want to show progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Drive
In late summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in competing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas echoed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now at more than 400 and intended to hit the objective of 600 members quickly. In addition to their existing facility at the UK base, the squad are in the phase of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to build the power unit, scheduled for the 2029 season – until then they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate structure, different from the movement in the sport for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred to.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said the team principal shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a range of project teams all focusing on distinct elements of the program at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader consults a manager in another department, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” says Chester. “So we empower staff to take charge. Eliminating managerial sign-off for all decisions is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile methodology will be proven in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is no little amount at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
