Approximately twelve months ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last given the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from nothing has involved a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be hosted in the US, with approximately three months to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the nascent operation in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its center from that point and enjoys a amused expression when reflecting on the experience.
“You can have a brief moment thinking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what the team has created in less than three years,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, there is still a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the owner, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you don’t get the possibility to alter team culture.”
With every day that passes minds are sharper on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the organization had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So that we turn up and we function efficiently. We want to show that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the circuit. When we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we will focus on progression subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Push
In the summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for the 2026 season, a duo remarkable for their invaluable experience in operating at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident with this setup, with this team, these people, there is every reason that we won't be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now at more than 400 and intended to attain the goal of six hundred swiftly. Alongside their existing facility at the UK base, the team are in the process of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the facility to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, at odds with the movement in the sport for more centralization, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” said Lowdon just before the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on different aspects of the mission at a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that manager consults a leader in another department, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and quicker.”
The Future
The efficacy of this agile strategy will be evaluated in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
