A little more than one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the official approval as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from scratch has involved a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team understand time is getting tight.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be staged in the US, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic operation in the spring of 2023 not long after it was formed, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart ever since and gets a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, how impressive what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we still have a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the task of launching the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry backed by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you don’t get the opportunity to alter team culture.”
With every day that elapses minds are increasingly concentrated on the impending critical moment in Australia and targets are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad entering the sport is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon noted recently and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the organization had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “In order that we show up and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the proper actions on the track. Once we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a duo notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We have a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe given this organization, with these individuals, this staff, it's entirely possible we won't be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end hiring has been in full swing, with staff now up to more than 400 and intended to reach the target of six hundred quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the team are in the midst of finishing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are building the plant to produce the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – until then they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organisation, contrary to the trend in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester alluded.
Space Mission Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” remarked Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British GP in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how difficult it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. OK, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all tackling different aspects of the mission at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their supervisor, that manager consults a supervisor somewhere else, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” says Chester. “Therefore we enable people to really get on with it. Eliminating managerial sign-off for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this nimble methodology will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
