Just over a full year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally awarded the official approval as Formula One’s most recent entry for 2026. Building the squad from nothing has involved a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport 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 held in the US, with just over three months to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent team in early 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center since then and has a amused expression when considering the ride.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what you’ve done and go: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
The CTO had success at Renault in Alonso's victorious campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the mission of launching the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the parent company, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Building an grand prix team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the possibility to transform team culture.”
With every day that goes by thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the looming critical moment in Australia and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any new team joining the grid is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an accomplishment in itself,” Lowdon stated recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the squad 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 perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team doing the correct procedures on the track. When we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Effort
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair notable for their priceless expertise in competing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, this staff, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To that end recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to attain the objective of 600 members swiftly. Alongside their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the phase of building an HQ at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to manufacture the new engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred to.
Apollo Model
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said the team principal shortly before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on different aspects of the mission at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a process where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that supervisor talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” notes Nick Chester. “So we empower staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this flexible approach will be proven in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is no little amount on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the emerging American Colton Herta
