Just over twelve months previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the official approval as F1's newest entrant for 2026. Constructing the squad from nothing has required a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be staged in the America, with around 100 days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic operation in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the organization were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center since then and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.
“You might get five minutes looking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
Nick Chester achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, GM, into Formula One.
“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to transform team culture.”
With every day that passes minds are sharper on the approaching decisive point in Australia and targets are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an accomplishment in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while the CTO shared this view he thought the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we turn up and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender performing the proper actions on the track. When we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we want to show forward movement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Push
In August they recruited Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the mood of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a huge amount 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 remain at the rear. I believe with this setup, with this group, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with personnel now at in excess of 400 and scheduled to hit the target of six hundred quickly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the phase of building an headquarters at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM works in North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to manufacture the new engine, set for 2029 – until then they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, at odds with the movement in F1 for increased consolidation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred to.
Space Mission Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” stated Graeme Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it feels like it sometimes.”
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 specialist groups all tackling various components of the mission at a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their team leader, that manager talks to a leader at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” explains Chester. “So we empower people to take charge. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble approach will be tested in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the young Californian Colton Herta
