Approximately twelve months ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the green light as Formula One’s newest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from the ground up has involved a hectic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 descends on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be held in the United States, with around three months to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a wry smile when thinking about the journey.
“You can have a short period thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in less than three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you consider: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the task of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a factory team sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you won't have the possibility to transform team culture.”
With each passing day that goes by focus are more focused on the approaching 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 just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon stated earlier this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he believed the team had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So we arrive and we perform competently. We want to show that we’re a proper team executing the correct procedures on the race track. Once we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Effort
In late summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We have a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident given this organization, with these individuals, this staff, 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 overdrive, with staff now at more than 400 and planned to reach the target of six hundred quickly. Complementing their existing facility at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of completing an headquarters at Fishers in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, contrary to the trend in the sport for more centralization, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Chester referred to.
Apollo Blueprint
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We’re realistic, we know how challenging it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all focusing on different aspects of the project across a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a protocol where an issue arises and they report it to their supervisor, that manager communicates with a leader at a different location, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable people to really get on with it. Avoiding management approval for everything is much smoother and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this flexible methodology will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
