A little more than twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the green light as Formula One’s newest entrant for 2026. Building the team from scratch has required a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the America, with approximately three months to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“There might be a short period thinking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, how impressive what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” he says. “And then the following moment you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
Chester had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical development at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the mission of bringing the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a works entry supported by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you don’t get the possibility to transform organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that elapses focus are increasingly concentrated on the approaching moment of truth in Melbourne and expectations are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad joining the grid is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” the team principal noted earlier this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So that we show up and we operate well. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the right things on the track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show forward movement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Effort
In the summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I am confident given this organization, with this team, these people, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now at over 400 and planned to attain the goal of 600 swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the phase of building an HQ at Fishers in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the center to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate organisation, contrary to the trend in the sport for more centralization, and has led to the new cultural approach to which the CTO alluded.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked the team principal shortly before the British GP in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how challenging it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all focusing on various components of the program across a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where an issue arises and they raise it up to their supervisor, that supervisor consults a leader at a different location, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” notes Nick Chester. “So we empower people to really get on with it. Moving away from management approval for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The efficacy of this agile methodology will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a significant degree at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
