Approximately twelve months previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the green light as F1's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from the ground up has involved a intense pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the US, with approximately a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will never be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic team in the spring of 2023 not long after it was established, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart since then and gets a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in less than three years,’” Chester states. “And then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to alter organizational mindset.”
With each day that elapses focus are increasingly concentrated on the impending critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we should be there,” he says. “So that we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the track. After we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Drive
In August they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their pilots for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I believe with this setup, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we won't be able to progress rapidly to the front and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now at over 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of finishing an headquarters at Fishers in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are building the facility to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, at odds with the direction in the sport for increased consolidation, and has inspired the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we recognize how difficult it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all working on various components of the mission at a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a protocol where an issue arises and they escalate it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a supervisor somewhere else, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The success of this flexible methodology will be tested in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
