Just over one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately given the green light as Formula One’s newest participant for 2026. Establishing the squad from nothing has involved a intense pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As the sport converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the season to be hosted in the America, with just over three months to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed team in the spring of 2023 not long after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center since then and gets a wry smile when reflecting on the ride.
“There might be five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and say: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yes, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Task
Nick Chester had success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the task of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the parent company, GM, into F1.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you won't have the opportunity to transform organizational mindset.”
With each day that elapses focus are sharper on the looming decisive point in Melbourne and targets are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team coming in is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Chester echoed this he believed the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “So that we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on improvement from there on.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Drive
In the summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a tandem distinguished for their priceless expertise in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe with this setup, with these individuals, these people, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now up to in excess of 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the phase of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will run Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organization, different from the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which the CTO alluded.
Space Mission Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, rather than the traditional management structure, a flat management structure comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all working on various components of the project at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a protocol where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their manager, that manager consults a leader at a different location, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “So we empower team members to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for all decisions is much smoother and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this agile approach will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
