Just over twelve months in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the official approval as Formula One’s latest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from scratch has entailed a intense work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac understand the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the final race of the championship to be staged in the America, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed team in March 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core since then and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.
“You can have a brief moment reflecting at what you’ve done and say: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what the team has created in under three years,’” he says. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
The CTO achieved victories at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious seasons of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the task of launching the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you rarely get the opportunity to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes minds are more focused on the looming moment of truth in Melbourne and goals are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team entering the sport is going to be last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted recently and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So that we show up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender doing the right things on the race track. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Push
In the summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a pair notable for their priceless expertise in operating at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver echoed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, it's entirely possible we can't manage to get relatively quickly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in full swing, with personnel now reaching in excess of 400 and intended to attain the objective of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the process of completing an headquarters at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to manufacture the new engine, set for 2029 – for now they will use Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a intricate organisation, contrary to the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” remarked the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We’re realistic, we know how difficult it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all tackling distinct elements of the mission at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they report it to their team leader, that manager consults a supervisor at a different location, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Eliminating management approval for each action is much smoother and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this nimble approach will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is no little amount on the line for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
