Approximately one year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the official approval as F1's latest entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from the ground up has entailed a frenetic pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As F1 descends on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the last event of the season to be held in the America, with around 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic team in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center since then and enjoys a knowing grin when considering the experience.
“You might get a short period reflecting at what you’ve done and think: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry backed by the parent company, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Building an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you won't have the opportunity to change team culture.”
With each day that goes by minds are more focused on the impending moment of truth in Melbourne and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that any incoming team coming in is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while the CTO shared this view he thought the organization had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we turn up and we perform competently. We want to show that we’re a proper team performing the right things on the circuit. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Effort
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their pilots for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and we expect probably a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end hiring has been in top gear, with staff now up to over 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 swiftly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the midst of building an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to manufacture the new engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organization, at odds with the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Model
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” stated Graeme Lowdon shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how tough it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all focusing on different aspects of the program in a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a procedure where an issue arises and they escalate it to their team leader, that manager talks to a leader in another department, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” notes Nick Chester. “So we empower team members to handle things directly. Eliminating hierarchical consent for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is no little amount riding on this for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
