Just over one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from scratch has involved a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the final race of the campaign to be held in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they make their debut for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed team in March 2023 not long after it was created, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core since then and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“You can have a short period looking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in less than three years,’” Chester states. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Building an F1 team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the opportunity to alter team culture.”
With each passing day that passes minds are sharper on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and goals are being managed.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment 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 perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in operating at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” he said. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and we expect almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we aren't joining to finish last. In my view given this organization, with this team, these people, 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 recruitment has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching in excess of 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their present headquarters at the UK base, the organization are in the process of completing an main base at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are building the facility to produce the power unit, planned for 2029 – until then they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, at odds with the direction in Formula One for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Model
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” stated Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we understand how tough it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. OK, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, instead of the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of project teams all focusing on different aspects of the program at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a procedure where someone has a problem and they report it to their manager, that leader communicates with a supervisor in another department, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains the CTO. “So we empower team members to take charge. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this nimble methodology will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
