A little more than a full year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last granted the green light as Formula One’s latest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from nothing has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One descends on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac understand time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the final race of the campaign to be held in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are conscious there will never be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in March 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.
“There might be five minutes reflecting at what you’ve done and say: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” he says. “But then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in control of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac marque, a factory team backed by the owner, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building an F1 team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you don’t get the possibility to alter team culture.”
With each passing day that elapses thoughts are more focused on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the team had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So we show up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the circuit. When we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In late summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We have a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. In my view with this structure, with this team, these people, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now at over 400 and scheduled to reach the target of 600 swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the phase of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to build the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will use Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex structure, different from the movement in F1 for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred.
Space Mission Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how tough it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of specialist groups all tackling various components of the project across a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they raise it up to their manager, that supervisor consults a manager somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for each action is much smoother and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this flexible approach will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
