Approximately twelve months ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the go-ahead as Formula One’s latest participant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from scratch has required a hectic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the season to be staged in the United States, with around three months to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed team in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was established, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a wry smile when considering the experience.
“You might get a brief moment looking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we’ve done in less than three years,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you realize: ‘Yes, there is still a great deal to do.’”
A Unique Challenge
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious seasons of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you won't have the opportunity to alter team culture.”
With each day that passes focus are sharper on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted recently and while Nick Chester echoed this he believed the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So that we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation doing the right things on the track. After we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Push
In late summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in competing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task 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 stay at the back. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, these personnel, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now up to more than 400 and planned to hit the objective of six hundred quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of completing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the direction in Formula One for more centralization, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester referred to.
Space Mission Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” stated the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all working on different aspects of the project across a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a process where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their team leader, that supervisor consults a supervisor in another department, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” says Chester. “We give authority to staff to handle things directly. Moving away from managerial sign-off for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this flexible methodology will be evaluated in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is no little amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the emerging American Colton Herta
