Approximately one year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's latest entry for 2026. Constructing the squad from nothing has involved a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport converges on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the last event of the championship to be held in the America, with just over three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic project in March 2023 shortly after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center ever since and gets a wry smile when thinking about the experience.
“You might get a brief moment thinking back at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
The CTO achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the task of launching the all-American Cadillac brand, a factory team supported by the parent company, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to transform cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses focus are more focused on the approaching moment of truth in Melbourne and expectations are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any new team joining the grid is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated earlier this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he thought the team had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “In order that we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation executing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Drive
In the summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas echoed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We have a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe with this setup, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with staff now up to more than 400 and scheduled to reach the objective of 600 members quickly. Complementing their current base at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – for now they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, contrary to the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
Space Mission Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal shortly before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of specialist groups all tackling various components of the project in a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their manager, that supervisor consults a supervisor at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” explains the CTO. “We give authority to team members to handle things directly. Moving away from hierarchical consent for all decisions is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this flexible approach will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
