A little more than twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the green light as Formula One’s latest participant for the 2026 season. Building the squad from scratch has involved a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the season to be held in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are conscious there will not be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic team in the spring of 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart from that point and has a amused expression when reflecting on the experience.
“There might be five minutes looking back at what you have accomplished and go: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “But then the next minute you think: ‘Well, we still have a great deal to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in Alonso's title-winning seasons of 2005/2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has been quite like the challenge of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the owner, GM, into Formula One.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to transform cultural approach.”
With every day that goes by focus are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in Australia and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that any new team joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the team had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we show up and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Drive
In the summer they signed Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the mood of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. In my view given this organization, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and intended to reach the objective of six hundred swiftly. Alongside their present headquarters at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of building an headquarters at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – in the meantime they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the direction in the sport for increased consolidation, and has inspired the innovative team culture to which the CTO referred.
Space Mission Model
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” said Lowdon ahead of the British GP in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all working on various components of the program in a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager consults a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “We give authority to people to really get on with it. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this nimble methodology will be evaluated in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their test driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
