Approximately one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally awarded the green light as Formula One’s latest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from the ground up has involved a frenetic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 descends on Vegas this race weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be hosted in the America, with approximately three months to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic project in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was established, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and gets a wry smile when considering the journey.
“There might be five minutes reflecting at what you’ve done and go: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in less than three years,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you don’t get the possibility to change organizational mindset.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the approaching critical moment in Australia and goals are being managed.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated this year and while Nick Chester echoed this he believed the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So that we turn up and we operate well. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team doing the right things on the track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In August they signed Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their pilots for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the mood of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with this group, these personnel, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and intended to reach the target of 600 members quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at the UK base, the team are in the process of completing an main base at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are developing the center to build the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, different from the trend in Formula One for more centralization, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how tough it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all working on different aspects of the mission at a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a protocol where an issue arises and they report it to their supervisor, that manager communicates with a supervisor at a different location, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” explains Chester. “We give authority to people to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for each action is much smoother and quicker.”
The Future
The efficacy of this nimble strategy will be tested in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is a significant degree at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
