A little more than a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the go-ahead as F1's most recent entrant for 2026. Establishing the organization from scratch has required a hectic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As F1 arrives on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the America, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic operation in the spring of 2023 not long after it was created, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core ever since and has a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get a short period thinking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in less than three years,’” he notes. “But then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the owner, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an F1 team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you rarely get the chance to alter organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal commented earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we want to show is that we should be there,” he says. “So that we arrive and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender doing the proper actions on the race track. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we want to show progression subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Drive
In August they recruited Checo Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair remarkable for their invaluable experience in performing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. In my view given this organization, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we won't be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To that end hiring has been in full swing, with employees now up to over 400 and scheduled to hit the target of six hundred rapidly. Alongside their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the phase of completing an HQ at Fishers in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to build the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, different from the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
Apollo Model
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” stated the team principal just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we understand how difficult it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all working on distinct elements of the mission across a different facilities.
“When you must follow a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their manager, that supervisor communicates with a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “We give authority to people to really get on with it. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble methodology will be proven in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is no little amount at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
