Just over one year ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the official approval as Formula One’s newest entrant for 2026. Building the organization from scratch has involved a frenetic operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As the sport descends on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the campaign to be hosted in the America, with approximately a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are conscious there will not be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic operation in early 2023 not long after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and has a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.
“You might get five minutes looking back at what you have accomplished and go: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he notes. “But then the next minute you consider: ‘Yes, there is still a great deal to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
The CTO achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of launching the all-American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an F1 team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you don’t get the opportunity to change team culture.”
With each passing day that goes by focus are sharper on the approaching moment of truth in Australia and expectations are being managed.
“One must presume 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 achievement in itself,” the team principal stated this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “So we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the right things on the circuit. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Effort
In August they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a tandem remarkable for their vast knowledge in operating at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I am confident with this structure, with this group, these people, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in top gear, with staff now at more than 400 and intended to reach the objective of six hundred swiftly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the phase of completing an main base at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the facility to produce the power unit, set for 2029 – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, at odds with the direction in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Chester referred.
NASA Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” stated Lowdon shortly before the British GP in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how tough it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, 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 decentralized management similar to that of NASA's, where there were a range of specialist groups all working on various components of the project at a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a process where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that supervisor communicates with a leader somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes Nick Chester. “So we empower staff to take charge. Moving away from hierarchical consent for everything is much smoother and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this flexible strategy will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount at stake for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
