Approximately twelve months in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the go-ahead as Formula One’s most recent entry for 2026. Constructing the team from scratch has required a intense operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the campaign to be staged in the America, with just over three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic operation in the spring of 2023 soon after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and has a amused expression when thinking about the experience.
“You can have five minutes looking back at what you’ve done and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” Chester states. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yes, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in charge of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the parent company, GM, into Formula One.
“Establishing an grand prix team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the opportunity to alter cultural approach.”
With every day that goes by minds are increasingly concentrated on the impending decisive point in Australia and targets are being managed.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated earlier this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the team had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he says. “So we show up and we operate well. We want to show that we’re a proper team performing the right things on the track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In August they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this group, this staff, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with personnel now at over 400 and planned to reach the objective of six hundred quickly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of completing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to produce the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – until then they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, contrary to the trend in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred to.
Apollo Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we understand how difficult it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. 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 akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of specialist groups all tackling different aspects of the mission in a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where an issue arises and they raise it up to their supervisor, that supervisor talks to a supervisor at a different location, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” says Nick Chester. “We give authority to team members to take charge. Avoiding management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
