Just over twelve months previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the green light as F1's most recent entry for 2026. Establishing the organization from the ground up has entailed a hectic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the final race of the championship to be hosted in the America, with approximately three months to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in March 2023 shortly after it was created, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center from that point and gets a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“You can have a brief moment thinking back at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you realize: ‘Well, there is still a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
The CTO enjoyed success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of bringing the iconic American Cadillac name, a factory team backed by the parent company, General Motors, into F1.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you rarely get the possibility to alter organizational mindset.”
With every day that passes focus are sharper on the approaching decisive point in the Australian GP and expectations are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any new team coming in is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal noted recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “In order that we show up and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the correct procedures on the track. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Effort
In late summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe given this organization, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now reaching over 400 and intended to reach the target of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the team are in the process of building an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are building the center to produce the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the movement in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” remarked the team principal ahead of the British GP in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how challenging it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all working on different aspects of the project across a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their manager, that leader communicates with a supervisor somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” notes Chester. “So we empower people to really get on with it. Avoiding management approval for everything is much smoother and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this agile methodology will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
