A little more than a full year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally awarded the go-ahead as F1's latest entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the organization from nothing has involved a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this race weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the season finale of the campaign to be staged in the United States, with just over three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team in early 2023 not long after it was formed, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core ever since and gets a amused expression when reflecting on the ride.
“There might be a short period thinking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you consider: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has quite compared with the task of introducing the all-American Cadillac name, a works entry supported by the parent company, GM, into Formula One.
“Creating an F1 team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you rarely get the opportunity to change team culture.”
With each day that goes by minds are more focused on the looming moment of truth in Australia and targets are being managed.
“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is going to be last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented earlier this year and while the CTO echoed this he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender executing the proper actions on the race track. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Effort
In August they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their priceless expertise in performing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver echoed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a difficult start, because it is F1. But we’re not there to finish last. In my view given this organization, with these individuals, these people, it's entirely possible we can't manage to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To that end recruitment has been in overdrive, with staff now at more than 400 and scheduled to reach the objective of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the phase of finishing an headquarters at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are developing the center to build the power unit, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will run power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Germany. It is a complex organisation, different from the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” stated Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we understand how tough it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a decentralized management akin to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of project teams all working on various components of the mission at a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a process where an issue arises and they escalate it to their manager, that supervisor consults a manager somewhere else, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” notes Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is so much cleaner and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this flexible approach will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
