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A little more than a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally awarded the go-ahead as F1's latest entrant for the 2026 season. Building the organization from scratch has required a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo program. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware time is getting tight.

The Countdown to Melbourne

At the season finale of the season to be held in the United States, with approximately three months to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will never be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent operation in March 2023 soon after it was formed, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core since then and gets a amused expression when reflecting on the experience.

“You can have a short period thinking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”

A One-of-a-Kind Task

Nick Chester had success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of bringing the all-American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the parent company, General Motors, into Formula One.

“Establishing an F1 team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you won't have the opportunity to change organizational mindset.”

With every day that passes minds are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in Melbourne and targets are being handled.

“It's reasonable to expect that any new team coming in is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted recently and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he felt the squad had a statement to make as well.

“The first thing we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender performing the right things on the race track. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we will focus on improvement subsequently.”

Pilot Selection and Team Building Effort

In August they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a tandem notable for their vast knowledge in performing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Bottas echoed the attitude of fighting spirit.

“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to stay at the back. I am confident given this organization, with these individuals, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and achieve good results.”

To that end recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to reach the target of six hundred quickly. Complementing their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the process of building an main base at Fishers in Indy and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to manufacture the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the trend in F1 for increased consolidation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred to.

Apollo Model

“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” remarked the team principal ahead of the Silverstone race in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how challenging it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”

So they have adopted, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of specialist groups all focusing on various components of the project at a multiple sites.

“If you have to go through a process where someone has a problem and they report it to their supervisor, that supervisor communicates with a manager at a different location, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes Nick Chester. “So we empower team members to handle things directly. Avoiding management approval for all decisions is far more efficient and quicker.”

Upcoming Challenges

The success of this nimble approach will be proven in the heat of competition next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta