A little more than a full year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately awarded the green light as the world of Formula One's latest participant for the 2026 season. Building the organization from nothing has involved a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 converges on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac know the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be hosted in the United States, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are aware there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a wry smile when considering the ride.
“There might be five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in a short three-year period,’” he says. “But then the next minute you realize: ‘Yeah, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
The CTO had success at the Renault team in Alonso's victorious years of 2005/2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the corporate entity, GM, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you don’t get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each day that goes by thoughts are sharper on the looming decisive point in Australia 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 just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon stated recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team doing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on progression after that.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Push
In the summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair distinguished for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver echoed the attitude of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he said. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I am confident with this structure, with this group, this staff, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition hiring has been in full swing, with employees now up to more than 400 and planned to attain the goal of 600 quickly. Alongside their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to produce the new engine, set for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate organisation, at odds with the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” remarked the team principal shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all working on distinct elements of the program in a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where an issue arises and they escalate it to their supervisor, that supervisor communicates with a supervisor in another department, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains the CTO. “We give authority to people to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble strategy will be evaluated in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
