A little more than one year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally granted the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent entry for the 2026 season. Building the team from the ground up has entailed a hectic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Australia
At the season finale of the season to be held in the America, with around a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the first time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are conscious there will never be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic team in early 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and gets a amused expression when thinking about the experience.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
Nick Chester had success at Renault in Alonso's championship-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the challenge of bringing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon commented recently and while Chester echoed this he thought the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “So that we arrive and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team executing the correct procedures on the track. After we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on improvement from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Push
In late summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver expressed the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “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’re not there to stay at the back. I believe given this organization, with this team, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to advance swiftly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in top gear, with staff now up to over 400 and intended to reach the objective of 600 members swiftly. Alongside their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for 2029 – for now they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate organisation, different from the trend in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
Apollo Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we know how tough it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. OK, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all focusing on different aspects of the project at a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that leader communicates with a manager somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” says the CTO. “We give authority to staff to handle things directly. Avoiding hierarchical consent for all decisions is far more efficient and quicker.”
The Future
The success of this nimble strategy will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a considerable amount on the line for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
