Approximately a full year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the go-ahead as F1's most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Building the squad from nothing has entailed a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the final race of the campaign to be staged in the US, with approximately a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Melbourne 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 aware there will not be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic project in March 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and gets a wry smile when thinking about the experience.
“There might be five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Chester had success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical development at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the owner, GM, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to transform team culture.”
With each day that passes focus are more focused on the impending moment of truth in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we should be there,” he says. “So that we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the track. Once we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a tandem notable for their vast knowledge in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas echoed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We have a massive task to do, and it will likely be most likely a difficult start, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. In my view given this organization, with this group, this staff, there is every reason that we can't manage to advance swiftly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in top gear, with personnel now up to in excess of 400 and intended to hit the goal of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at Silverstone, the squad are in the midst of completing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated organisation, at odds with the movement in F1 for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred to.
NASA Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” stated the team principal ahead of the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how difficult it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all focusing on distinct elements of the mission at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they report it to their manager, that leader communicates with a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” says the CTO. “We give authority to people to really get on with it. Eliminating management approval for each action is much smoother and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this flexible approach will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta
