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Approximately one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last awarded the official approval as F1's newest entrant for 2026. Establishing the team from scratch has entailed a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One descends on Vegas this weekend, the team understand time is getting tight.

The Countdown to Melbourne

At the final race of the championship to be hosted in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic operation in early 2023 not long after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when considering the ride.

“You might get five minutes reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yeah, there is still a great deal to do.’”

An Unprecedented Challenge

The CTO achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's championship-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the mission of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, General Motors, into Formula One.

“Creating an grand prix team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the opportunity to alter cultural approach.”

With each passing day that passes thoughts are more focused on the impending decisive point in the Australian GP and goals are being managed.

“You have to assume that any incoming team coming in is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal noted earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the squad had a statement to make as well.

“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “In order that we turn up and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the right things on the track. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement subsequently.”

Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort

In August they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.

“Of course, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We have a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be most likely a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. I believe with this structure, with this team, this staff, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and achieve good results.”

To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in top gear, with employees now reaching over 400 and scheduled to attain the target of 600 swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at Silverstone, the team are in the process of building an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are constructing the plant to build the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester referred to.

Space Mission Model

“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said the team principal shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”

So they have embraced, as opposed to the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all working on distinct elements of the mission at a variety of locations.

“If you have to go through a protocol where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their manager, that leader talks to a manager in another department, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” says Nick Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Moving away from management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”

Upcoming Challenges

The success of this nimble approach will be evaluated in the heat of competition next season and there is no little amount on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the young American Colton Herta