Just over a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately granted the green light as Formula One’s most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from scratch has required a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 converges on Las Vegas this weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the final race of the season to be held in the America, with just over 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic team in March 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center ever since and enjoys a amused expression when considering the experience.
“There might be a brief moment thinking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Challenge
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the challenge of launching the iconic American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to transform team culture.”
With every day that passes thoughts are more focused on the approaching critical moment in Australia and targets are being handled.
“One must presume that any new team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon commented earlier this year and while the CTO shared this view he believed the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the race track. Once we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we will focus on improvement after that.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Drive
In August they signed Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a pair remarkable for their vast knowledge in performing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we won't be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with staff now reaching in excess of 400 and planned to reach the objective of six hundred rapidly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of finishing an main base at Fishers in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to manufacture the power unit, set for 2029 – for now they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organisation, different from the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” remarked the team principal shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We’re realistic, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, rather than the conventional chain of command, a decentralized management akin to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all tackling distinct elements of the project in a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a protocol where an issue arises and they report it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a supervisor in another department, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Eliminating managerial sign-off for all decisions is much smoother and more rapid.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile methodology will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
