Just over twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the go-ahead as F1's newest entrant for 2026. Building the squad from scratch has involved a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As the sport converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the final race of the championship to be hosted in the US, with just over a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team in the spring of 2023 soon after it was formed, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart ever since and gets a knowing grin when thinking about the experience.
“You can have five minutes reflecting at what you have accomplished and go: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you consider: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has been quite like the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac brand, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an F1 team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you won't have the chance to change team culture.”
With each day that goes by minds are sharper on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and targets are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any new team joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while Chester echoed this he felt the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So that we arrive and we perform competently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the circuit. When we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Effort
In late summer they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for the 2026 season, a duo remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas reflected the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “We face a massive task to do, and we expect probably a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now up to more than 400 and planned to reach the objective of six hundred swiftly. Alongside their present headquarters at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the phase of completing an headquarters at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to produce the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – until then they will run Ferrari power units – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
Space Mission Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” stated Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a decentralized management akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all tackling various components of the program across a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they escalate it to their manager, that manager communicates with a supervisor at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains Nick Chester. “So we empower staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be tested in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a significant degree on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their reserve driver the young Californian Colton Herta
