A little more than a full year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's newest participant for 2026. Constructing the team from nothing has entailed a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo program. As F1 descends on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the America, with just over three months to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed project in March 2023 soon after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Well, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO had success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the mission of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you don’t get the opportunity to transform team culture.”
With every day that elapses minds are increasingly concentrated on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” the team principal commented recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the team had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So that we arrive and we operate well. We want to show that we are a serious contender performing the proper actions on the race track. After we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for the 2026 season, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in performing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a tough opening, because it is F1. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. In my view with this structure, with this group, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in top gear, with personnel now reaching over 400 and intended to attain the objective of 600 quickly. Alongside their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the process of finishing an main base at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to manufacture the power unit, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate structure, at odds with the movement in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester referred.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in July. “We’re realistic, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have implemented, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a decentralized management comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of project teams all tackling various components of the project across a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they report it to their team leader, that manager talks to a manager in another department, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” says the CTO. “Therefore we enable staff to really get on with it. Avoiding managerial sign-off for everything is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
The Future
The efficacy of this agile approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount on the line for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
