Approximately one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from nothing has involved a frenetic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As Formula One converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the season to be held in the United States, with approximately three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will not be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent project in early 2023 soon after it was established, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart from that point and enjoys a amused expression when reflecting on the ride.
“You might get a brief moment thinking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” he says. “But then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Challenge
Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry supported by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you don’t get the chance to alter team culture.”
With each passing day that goes by focus are increasingly concentrated on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and expectations are being handled.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Chester echoed this he thought the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the track. When we prove that our credentials are solid, then we want to show forward movement from there on.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In August they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in operating at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to finish last. In my view with this setup, with this team, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now up to in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of building an HQ at Fishers in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate structure, at odds with the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred.
Apollo Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” said the team principal just before the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how difficult it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of specialist groups all tackling distinct elements of the project at a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they report it to their manager, that leader consults a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable staff to take charge. Eliminating managerial sign-off for everything is so much cleaner and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this flexible strategy will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
