Approximately one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the official approval as F1's newest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from the ground up has entailed a frenetic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the championship to be staged in the America, with around a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are cognizant there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed operation in early 2023 soon after it was created, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart from that point and gets a amused expression when considering the ride.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the following moment you consider: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious years of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical development at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of launching the iconic American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors, into F1.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you rarely get the chance to alter team culture.”
With each passing day that passes focus are more focused on the impending decisive point in Melbourne and expectations are being handled.
“One must presume that any incoming team coming in is going to be last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” the team principal commented recently and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he believed the team had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So that we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender doing the correct procedures on the circuit. After we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in performing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. In my view given this organization, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to the front and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in full swing, with personnel now reaching in excess of 400 and scheduled to reach the goal of 600 members quickly. Alongside their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the midst of completing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – for now they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we recognize how tough it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, rather than the traditional management structure, a decentralized management akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of specialist groups all working on distinct elements of the program at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a protocol where an issue arises and they raise it up to their team leader, that supervisor talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “So we empower people to really get on with it. Eliminating managerial sign-off for everything is much smoother and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this agile approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
