Approximately twelve months previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the go-ahead as Formula One’s newest participant for 2026. Constructing the squad from the ground up has required a hectic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the final race of the campaign to be staged in the America, with just over three months to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are aware there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was formed, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and gets a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“You can have five minutes thinking back at what you’ve done and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “But then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the mission of bringing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building 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 established team you rarely get the chance to transform cultural approach.”
With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the approaching decisive point in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad coming in is going to be last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon commented this year and while Chester echoed this he believed the team had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So we arrive and we perform competently. We want to show that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the track. After we have demonstrated that we are a legitimate team, then we want to show progression after that.”
Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they recruited Sergio Perez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem remarkable for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and Bottas reflected the attitude of combative optimism.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. In my view given this organization, with this group, these people, there’s no reason why we can't manage to advance swiftly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now at in excess of 400 and intended to reach the goal of six hundred quickly. In addition to their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the process of completing an main base at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are constructing the facility to build the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated organisation, contrary to the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” stated the team principal just before the British GP in July. “We’re realistic, we know how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, rather than the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of project teams all focusing on distinct elements of the mission across a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that leader talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “We give authority to people to take charge. Eliminating managerial sign-off for each action is much smoother and quicker.”
The Future
The efficacy of this flexible methodology will be tested in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
