A little more than twelve months ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the official approval as F1's most recent entrant for 2026. Establishing the organization from scratch has entailed a frenetic operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be staged in the United States, with just over a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was formed, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a wry smile when reflecting on the ride.
“You might get a short period reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, what an achievement what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Task
The CTO enjoyed success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has been quite like the challenge of introducing the all-American Cadillac brand, a works entry sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Creating an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you rarely get the possibility to transform team culture.”
With each day that passes minds are more focused on the impending critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being managed.
“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “In order that we turn up and we function efficiently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the correct procedures on the circuit. When we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In August they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a duo distinguished for their vast knowledge in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, these people, it's entirely possible we won't be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now at over 400 and intended to attain the target of 600 members swiftly. In addition to their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of completing an main base at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are building the plant to produce the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, contrary to the trend in F1 for increased consolidation, and has inspired the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester alluded.
Apollo Blueprint
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” stated Graeme Lowdon ahead of the Silverstone race in July. “We’re realistic, we know how difficult it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all tackling different aspects of the mission at a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a supervisor somewhere else, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” explains Nick Chester. “We give authority to team members to handle things directly. Moving away from hierarchical consent for all decisions is so much cleaner and quicker.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta
