A little more than twelve months in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the green light as the world of Formula One's latest entry for the 2026 season. Building the squad from nothing has required a frenetic pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be held in the United States, with around 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed team in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and gets a wry smile when considering the experience.
“There might be a brief moment thinking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in under three years,’” Chester states. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical direction at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the challenge of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a factory team sponsored by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Building an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you rarely get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the impending moment of truth in Australia and targets are being managed.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad coming in is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that this is a professional operation doing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Push
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in performing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he said. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. In my view given this organization, with these individuals, these personnel, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in top gear, with personnel now at more than 400 and intended to attain the target of six hundred swiftly. In addition to their present headquarters at Silverstone, the organization are in the midst of building an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to produce the new engine, set for 2029 – in the meantime they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, at odds with the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
Space Mission Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” stated Lowdon shortly before the British GP in the summer. “We’re realistic, we recognize how difficult it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of project teams all focusing on different aspects of the program at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a process where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager consults a leader at a different location, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to really get on with it. Avoiding management approval for everything is so much cleaner and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this agile approach will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have taken on as their test driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
