A little more than one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest participant for 2026. Constructing the squad from scratch has entailed a hectic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Australia
At the season finale of the campaign to be staged in the United States, with just over three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in early 2023 not long after it was formed, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its center since then and has a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in less than three years,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you rarely get the opportunity to change team culture.”
With each passing day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the impending moment of truth in Australia and targets are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad entering the sport is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated recently and while Nick Chester shared this view he thought the organization had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So we show up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the right things on the race track. After we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In late summer they signed Sergio Perez and Bottas as their pilots for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their priceless expertise in competing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver expressed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We face a massive task to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with staff now reaching in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 members quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of completing an main base at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the center to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate organization, different from the trend in F1 for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
Apollo Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We’re realistic, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on different aspects of the program in a different facilities.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a supervisor in another department, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” says the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Eliminating management approval for everything is far more efficient and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this nimble approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing next season and there is a significant degree at stake for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
