A little more than twelve months ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the organization from scratch has required a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Vegas this race weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the America, with approximately a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are aware there will never be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent operation in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a wry smile when considering the journey.
“You can have a short period reflecting at what you’ve done and think: ‘Wow, what an achievement what the team has created in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you realize: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has truly matched the challenge of bringing the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to change team culture.”
With each day that elapses thoughts are more focused on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being set realistically.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated recently and while the CTO echoed this he thought the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So that we turn up and we perform competently. We want to show that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a tandem remarkable for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, this staff, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to the front and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now at more than 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 quickly. In addition to their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the midst of completing an headquarters at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – until then they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the trend in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester referred.
Apollo Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in July. “We’re realistic, we know how difficult it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of specialist groups all focusing on distinct elements of the program at a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a procedure where someone has a problem and they report it to their team leader, that manager communicates with a supervisor at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable people to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is much smoother and quicker.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
