Just over one year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the official approval as F1's newest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from scratch has entailed a hectic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the campaign to be held in the United States, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, 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 core ever since and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get a brief moment thinking back at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in less than three years,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of introducing the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the parent company, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the opportunity to alter cultural approach.”
With each passing day that elapses focus are more focused on the impending critical moment in Melbourne and targets are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any incoming team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” the team principal noted earlier this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the team had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So that we show up and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the right things on the track. When we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Effort
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a duo remarkable for their invaluable experience in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Bottas echoed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a massive task to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I am confident with this structure, with this team, these people, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and scheduled to attain the target of six hundred swiftly. In addition to their current base at Silverstone, the organization are in the phase of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to build the power unit, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organisation, contrary to the movement in Formula One for more centralization, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Chester referred to.
Space Mission Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” stated the team principal ahead of the Silverstone race in July. “We are pragmatic, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of project teams all tackling different aspects of the program across a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where an issue arises and they report it to their team leader, that leader talks to a supervisor in another department, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Nick Chester. “So we empower staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for everything is so much cleaner and quicker.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is no little amount on the line for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
