A little more than one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last awarded the green light as the world of Formula One's latest entrant for 2026. Constructing the team from nothing has involved a frenetic operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the championship to be held in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia 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 endeavor, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent project in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its center from that point and enjoys a amused expression when considering the experience.
“You might get a short period thinking back at what you have accomplished and go: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “But then the following moment you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in charge of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the parent company, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an F1 team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you rarely get the opportunity to alter organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that elapses minds are more focused on the looming decisive point in Australia and goals are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon commented recently and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender doing the right things on the circuit. Once we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Push
In August they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo distinguished for their priceless expertise in competing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident with this structure, with this team, these personnel, there is every reason that we won't be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with staff now at over 400 and scheduled to hit the target of 600 swiftly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the midst of completing an main base at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to manufacture the power unit, scheduled for 2029 – until then they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex structure, different from the direction in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO alluded.
Space Mission Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” remarked Lowdon just before the British GP in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all focusing on various components of the program in a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that supervisor talks to a leader at a different location, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” says Nick Chester. “So we empower people to take charge. Eliminating managerial sign-off for all decisions is much smoother and more rapid.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be tested in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. Cadillac have signed as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
