Just over one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the go-ahead as Formula One’s latest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from nothing has required a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As the sport descends on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the last event of the championship to be held in the America, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed operation in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and gets a wry smile when considering the journey.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
The CTO had success at the Renault team in Alonso's victorious years of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the challenge of bringing the all-American Cadillac marque, a works entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you rarely get the chance to alter cultural approach.”
With every day that goes by minds are sharper on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and expectations are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” the team principal stated recently and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation doing the right things on the circuit. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we want to show forward movement from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Push
In the summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a tandem distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver expressed the mood of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and we expect most likely a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. In my view given this organization, with this group, these people, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now at in excess of 400 and intended to attain the target of 600 members quickly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the midst of completing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to build the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will use Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, contrary to the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester alluded.
Space Mission Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said the team principal shortly before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We’re realistic, we understand how difficult it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, rather than the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of specialist groups all focusing on distinct elements of the project at a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their manager, that manager communicates with a leader in another department, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “So we empower team members to really get on with it. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The efficacy of this nimble methodology will be proven in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
