Just over one year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's newest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from scratch has entailed a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 arrives on Vegas this race weekend, the team are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the season to be staged in the US, with approximately three months to go before they hit the circuit for the first time 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 monumental challenge, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent team in early 2023 soon after it was created, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and gets a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get a short period looking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Wow, how impressive what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry supported by the owner, General Motors, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the opportunity to transform organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that goes by thoughts are sharper on the impending critical moment in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team entering the sport is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted earlier this year and while the CTO shared this view he thought the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “In order that we show up and we operate well. We want to show that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the race track. After we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate progression after that.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Push
In August they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a pair notable for their priceless expertise in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We have a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I believe with this setup, with this group, these personnel, there is every reason that we won't be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching over 400 and planned to reach the goal of 600 quickly. Alongside their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to produce the new engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organization, different from the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester referred.
Apollo Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all tackling various components of the program across a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a procedure where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their supervisor, that leader consults a supervisor somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable people to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and quicker.”
The Future
The success of this flexible methodology will be proven in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
