A little more than a full year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately given the official approval as the world of Formula One's newest participant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from scratch has required a hectic operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the championship to be hosted in the US, with around a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent project in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and has a wry smile when considering the ride.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, there is still a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical development at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the task of introducing the all-American Cadillac marque, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Building an Formula One team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to alter cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses thoughts are more focused on the approaching moment of truth in Melbourne and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any new team coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented earlier this year and while Chester 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,” he says. “So we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the proper actions on the track. After we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Push
In August they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a pair remarkable for their priceless expertise in competing at the front in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and Bottas reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “We have a massive task to do, and we expect most likely a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this team, these people, there’s no reason why we won't be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in top gear, with staff now up to more than 400 and scheduled to reach the goal of six hundred quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the process of finishing an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to produce the power unit, planned for 2029 – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the movement in the sport for more centralization, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred.
Space Mission Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo program,” said the team principal ahead of the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We’re realistic, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the conventional chain of command, a decentralized management similar to that of NASA's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on different aspects of the project across a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a process where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader consults a manager somewhere else, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” explains Nick Chester. “We give authority to staff to really get on with it. Moving away from management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing next season and there is a significant degree at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
