A little more than a full year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last awarded the official approval as F1's latest participant for 2026. Constructing the team from nothing has involved a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the championship to be held in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a amused expression when considering the experience.
“You can have a brief moment looking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yeah, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you don’t get the possibility to change cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses focus are increasingly concentrated on the approaching critical moment in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad coming in is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the team had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we turn up and we perform competently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Drive
In August they contracted Sergio Perez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair remarkable for their invaluable experience in operating at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with this team, these people, there’s no reason why we won't be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To that end recruitment has been in overdrive, with employees now reaching more than 400 and planned to hit the goal of 600 members rapidly. In addition to their present headquarters at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of building an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to build the new engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex structure, contrary to the movement in the sport for greater centralisation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester alluded.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” remarked Lowdon shortly before the British Grand Prix in July. “We are pragmatic, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all tackling various components of the mission at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that supervisor communicates with a supervisor in another department, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains the CTO. “We give authority to team members to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is no little amount at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
