A little more than twelve months in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the go-ahead as Formula One’s newest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the organization from nothing has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the season to be staged in the America, with around three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are cognizant there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed team in early 2023 not long after it was formed, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and gets a amused expression when considering the experience.
“You can have five minutes reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
The CTO had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of bringing the all-American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to change team culture.”
With each day that elapses focus are increasingly concentrated on the impending 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 feat in itself,” Lowdon commented earlier this year and while Chester shared this view he felt the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So we show up and we operate well. We want to show that we’re a proper team executing the correct procedures on the circuit. After we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In August they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a duo distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with personnel now reaching in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of six hundred quickly. Complementing their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the midst of finishing an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are constructing the center to manufacture the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – until then they will run Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organization, contrary to the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester referred to.
Apollo Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo program,” stated Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British GP in July. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how tough it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all tackling distinct elements of the mission across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a leader somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” says Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this nimble approach will be tested in the heat of competition next season and there is no little amount on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
