A little more than twelve months ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the go-ahead as F1's newest entrant for 2026. Constructing the team from scratch has involved a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One converges on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be held in the US, with approximately three months to go before they make their debut for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will never be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic project in the spring of 2023 soon after it was established, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and enjoys a wry smile when thinking about the ride.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what you’ve done and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of launching the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you rarely get the opportunity to change organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the impending critical moment in Australia and expectations are being handled.
“You have to assume that any new team joining the grid is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” the team principal noted earlier this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we show up and we perform competently. We want to show that this is a professional operation doing the right things on the circuit. When we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In the summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a pair remarkable for their invaluable experience in performing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Bottas echoed the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. 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 a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now at more than 400 and scheduled to reach the target of 600 rapidly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the phase of building an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to manufacture the power unit, planned for the 2029 season – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate organisation, at odds with the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Model
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” remarked the team principal shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we know how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all working on different aspects of the project at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a protocol where an issue arises and they report it to their manager, that supervisor consults a manager in another department, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” says the CTO. “We give authority to people to handle things directly. Eliminating managerial sign-off for each action is much smoother and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this agile approach will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is no little amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
