Just over twelve months ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the green light as Formula One’s newest entrant for 2026. Building the squad from the ground up has entailed a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As F1 arrives on the Vegas strip this weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Australia
At the season finale of the season to be held in the United States, with around a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent project in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when considering the experience.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yes, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Nick Chester achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's title-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has been quite like the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac marque, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you rarely get the opportunity to transform team culture.”
With every day that passes minds are sharper on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being managed.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal commented this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the team had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Push
In the summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a tandem notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver expressed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. In my view given this organization, with this group, these people, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in full swing, with staff now reaching in excess of 400 and scheduled to attain the objective of 600 members swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at the UK base, the squad are in the phase of building an headquarters at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the plant to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex structure, at odds with the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has inspired the new cultural approach to which Chester referred.
Space Mission Inspiration
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” remarked the team principal shortly before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all tackling various components of the mission across a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that supervisor communicates with a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes Chester. “We give authority to team members to really get on with it. Eliminating hierarchical consent for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The success of this flexible strategy will be tested in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a significant degree at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the young Californian Colton Herta
