Approximately one year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally awarded the go-ahead as F1's newest participant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from the ground up has involved a intense operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the campaign to be staged in the US, with around three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent project in early 2023 not long after it was created, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its center since then and gets a knowing grin when considering the journey.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
The CTO achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's victorious seasons of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of bringing the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the parent company, GM, into Formula One.
“Creating an grand prix team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you won't have the chance to transform team culture.”
With each day that elapses focus are sharper on the approaching moment of truth in Australia and expectations are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any incoming team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented earlier this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So we turn up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation executing the correct procedures on the track. When we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Push
In the summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas expressed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We have a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to stay at the back. I believe given this organization, with this team, these personnel, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to the front and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now up to over 400 and planned to reach the target of six hundred rapidly. Alongside their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the phase of completing an main base at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the direction in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred.
Apollo Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” stated Graeme Lowdon shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we know how challenging it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of project teams all working on different aspects of the project across a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their team leader, that supervisor talks to a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains Chester. “We give authority to staff to take charge. Eliminating management approval for all decisions is far more efficient and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this agile approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree on the line for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
