A little more than a full year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately granted the green light as F1's newest entrant for 2026. Constructing the organization from nothing has involved a hectic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport arrives on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team know time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be staged in the America, with just over three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic operation in March 2023 not long after it was created, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its center since then and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the ride.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Nick Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the all-American Cadillac brand, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Creating an F1 team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you don’t get the possibility to change team culture.”
With each passing day that passes focus are increasingly concentrated on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being set realistically.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon commented recently and while Nick Chester echoed this he felt the team had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So we turn up and we perform competently. We want to show that we’re a proper team executing the proper actions on the circuit. After we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show forward movement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In August they signed Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem remarkable for their priceless expertise in operating at the front in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Bottas echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to finish last. I believe given this organization, with this team, these people, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in overdrive, with staff now up to more than 400 and planned to hit the objective of 600 members quickly. In addition to their existing facility at Silverstone, the organization are in the midst of finishing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to build the new engine, planned for 2029 – until then they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, contrary to the movement in F1 for greater centralisation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester referred.
Space Mission Model
“It’s highly modelled on the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we understand how difficult it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all focusing on various components of the mission across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their manager, that leader communicates with a supervisor somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to really get on with it. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this nimble strategy will be proven in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is no little amount riding on this for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
