Approximately a full year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the go-ahead as F1's newest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from nothing has involved a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac understand time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the final race of the campaign to be hosted in the US, with around a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit 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 never-ending task, they are cognizant there will never be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic team in March 2023 shortly after it was established, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its center from that point and enjoys a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“You can have five minutes reflecting at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you realize: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical development at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the task of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a works entry supported by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you don’t get the possibility to alter organizational mindset.”
With each day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the approaching decisive point in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is going to be last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Lowdon stated recently and while the CTO echoed this he believed the team had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “In order that we show up and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team executing the right things on the race track. After we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we will focus on progression after that.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In August they signed Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem remarkable for their priceless expertise in competing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas expressed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. I am confident given this organization, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with personnel now up to in excess of 400 and intended to attain the objective of six hundred swiftly. Alongside their current base at Silverstone, the organization are in the process of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to build the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate organization, contrary to the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We’re realistic, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, instead of the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all focusing on distinct elements of the mission across a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that manager talks to a leader in another department, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “So we empower people to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this agile methodology will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta
