A little more than twelve months in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the official approval as F1's newest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from nothing has entailed a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the America, with approximately three months to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic team in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, how impressive what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the following moment you realize: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in control of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the corporate entity, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Establishing an Formula One team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to transform cultural approach.”
With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being handled.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted recently and while the CTO shared this view he felt the team had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “In order that we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the circuit. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate progression after that.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Push
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair distinguished for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the sentiment of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident given this organization, with this team, this staff, it's entirely possible we can't manage to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now reaching more than 400 and intended to reach the target of 600 members quickly. Complementing their existing facility at the UK base, the team are in the midst of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are developing the center to build the power unit, set for 2029 – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex structure, at odds with the direction in F1 for more centralization, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred.
Apollo Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” stated Graeme Lowdon shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all working on different aspects of the program at a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a process where someone has a problem and they report it to their supervisor, that supervisor communicates with a supervisor at a different location, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” explains Chester. “So we empower people to really get on with it. Eliminating management approval for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this nimble approach will be tested in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a considerable amount on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
