Approximately one year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's newest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the organization from the ground up has required a frenetic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac understand time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be held in the US, with around 100 days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center from that point and has a amused expression when reflecting on the journey.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” he notes. “But then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, we still have a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Task
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you won't have the possibility to transform team culture.”
With each passing day that passes focus are more focused on the approaching critical moment in Australia and expectations are being handled.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad joining the grid is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we should be there,” he says. “In order that we show up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the track. After we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we want to show forward movement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Push
In late summer they signed Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in performing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to finish last. I believe with this structure, with this team, these people, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To that end recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now at over 400 and scheduled to attain the goal of 600 rapidly. Alongside their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the process of completing an main base at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are constructing the facility to manufacture the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – until then they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, at odds with the direction in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred to.
Apollo Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all focusing on various components of the mission at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their team leader, that leader talks to a leader somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for everything is so much cleaner and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible strategy will be proven in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
