A little more than one year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the official approval as the world of Formula One's most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Building the team from scratch has entailed a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the season finale of the campaign to be hosted in the United States, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are cognizant there will never be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed team in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was created, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart ever since and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the ride.
“You might get five minutes reflecting at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you think: ‘Well, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical development at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that elapses minds are more focused on the looming critical moment in Australia and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal commented this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we turn up and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team executing the right things on the race track. When we prove that our credentials are solid, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Push
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Bottas expressed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We face a massive task to do, and we expect probably a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I am confident with this setup, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to get relatively quickly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to reach the goal of 600 members quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are constructing the plant to produce the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the direction in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” remarked Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We’re realistic, we know how difficult it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of project teams all focusing on various components of the mission in a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where an issue arises and they escalate it to their supervisor, that leader communicates with a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” says the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The efficacy of this nimble methodology will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is no little amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
