Approximately one year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last given the go-ahead as F1's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from scratch has involved a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One descends on the Vegas strip this weekend, Cadillac know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the America, with just over three months 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 never-ending challenge, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and enjoys a amused expression when reflecting on the journey.
“You might get a brief moment reflecting at what you’ve done and think: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in less than three years,’” he says. “Then the next minute you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has been quite like the mission of introducing the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you won't have the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With every day that goes by focus are more focused on the impending critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being managed.
“You have to assume that any incoming team joining the grid is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So that we arrive and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Drive
In late summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We have a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. I am confident given this organization, with this team, these personnel, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with personnel now reaching over 400 and scheduled to reach the objective of 600 rapidly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the team are in the phase of completing an main base at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are developing the center to manufacture the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, different from the trend in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” stated Graeme Lowdon shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how tough it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. Well, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on various components of the program at a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that supervisor talks to a leader in another department, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is much smoother and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible strategy will be evaluated in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is no little amount on the line for F1, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the young American Colton Herta
