Approximately one year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the green light as the world of Formula One's newest entrant for the 2026 season. Building the organization from scratch has involved a hectic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac are aware the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be hosted in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent team in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“You might get five minutes thinking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
The CTO enjoyed success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of launching the all-American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the owner, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Building an F1 team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you don’t get the chance to alter organizational mindset.”
With every day that goes by focus are more focused on the looming moment of truth in Australia and goals are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while Chester shared this view he thought the organization had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So we show up and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the track. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Drive
In August they recruited Checo Pérez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair notable for their priceless expertise in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We have a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this group, these people, there’s no reason why we won't be able to progress rapidly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now up to over 400 and planned to reach the objective of 600 members quickly. Alongside their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the midst of building an HQ at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to build the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, at odds with the movement in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” said the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of project teams all working on distinct elements of the mission across a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that manager consults a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” says the CTO. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this flexible approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
