A little more than twelve months previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last awarded the green light as F1's most recent participant for 2026. Building the team from nothing has required a frenetic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As F1 converges on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the season finale of the campaign to be staged in the United States, with just over three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are cognizant there will never be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic project in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was created, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.
“You might get a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what the team has created in less than three years,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Challenge
Chester had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the task of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a works entry supported by the parent company, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Creating 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 well-set team you won't have the chance to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that goes by thoughts are sharper on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“One must presume that any incoming team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while Chester echoed this he felt the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “So that we turn up and we operate well. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the proper actions on the circuit. Once we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Drive
In the summer they signed Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a tandem notable for their priceless expertise in operating at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We have a massive task to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end hiring has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and scheduled to hit the objective of 600 quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are constructing the facility to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate organisation, at odds with the movement in F1 for more centralization, and has led to the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” remarked the team principal just before the Silverstone race in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on various components of the mission across a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a process where an issue arises and they raise it up to their team leader, that supervisor talks to a leader in another department, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” explains the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for everything is far more efficient and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this agile strategy will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
