Approximately a full year ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally awarded the green light as F1's most recent participant for 2026. Establishing the team from the ground up has required a hectic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport descends on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be hosted in the US, with just over three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are conscious there will not be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic operation in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core since then and has a amused expression when considering the experience.
“There might be a short period thinking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “But then the next minute you think: ‘Yeah, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005/2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the task of launching the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you don’t get the chance to change cultural approach.”
With each passing day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the looming decisive point in Australia and goals are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect 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,” the team principal noted this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he believed the team had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing 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 are a serious contender executing the proper actions on the race track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Push
In August they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a duo remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. I believe with this setup, with this team, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now reaching in excess of 400 and scheduled to hit the target of 600 members quickly. In addition to their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the process of completing an main base at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to build the new engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will use Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the movement in F1 for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
NASA Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo program,” said Lowdon ahead of the Silverstone race in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how difficult it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, instead of the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all tackling various components of the mission in a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they report it to their team leader, that supervisor talks to a supervisor somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” explains the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Eliminating management approval for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this nimble approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta