Just over twelve months in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the green light as the world of Formula One's latest entry for the 2026 season. Building the squad from the ground up has required a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As the sport arrives on Vegas this race weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Australia
At the season finale of the championship to be staged in the US, with approximately three months to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic team in March 2023 soon after it was created, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and has a amused expression when considering the experience.
“There might be a short period thinking back at what you have accomplished and go: ‘Wow, how impressive what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “And then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
Chester had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you won't have the chance to change team culture.”
With every day that passes minds are increasingly concentrated on the approaching critical moment in Australia and expectations are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon stated this year and while Nick Chester shared this view he believed the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Drive
In August they contracted Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their vast knowledge in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he said. “We have a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe with this setup, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now up to over 400 and planned to reach the target of six hundred swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of finishing an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to produce the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, at odds with the trend in F1 for more centralization, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of specialist groups all tackling different aspects of the project in a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their team leader, that leader talks to a manager in another department, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” says Nick Chester. “We give authority to staff to really get on with it. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this nimble strategy will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a significant degree at stake for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
