Just over one year in the past at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the green light as Formula One’s most recent entry for 2026. Establishing the squad from nothing has entailed a frenetic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One converges on Vegas this race weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the season finale of the campaign to be held in the United States, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic team in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was established, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.
“You might get five minutes reflecting at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what the team has created in less than three years,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Nick Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in Alonso's championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the challenge of launching the all-American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the owner, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you won't have the possibility to transform team culture.”
With each passing day that goes by minds are more focused on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while Chester echoed this he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “So we turn up and we operate well. We want to show that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the race track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Push
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo distinguished for their vast knowledge in performing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, and Bottas expressed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it’s going to be probably a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to finish last. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, these people, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in top gear, with employees now up to more than 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 rapidly. Complementing their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of finishing an HQ at Fishers in Indy and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to build the new engine, set for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will use Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, contrary to the movement in the sport for greater centralisation, and has led to the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred.
Space Mission Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” remarked Lowdon ahead of the British GP in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, instead of the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all working on various components of the mission across a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that supervisor consults a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” says Nick Chester. “So we empower people to handle things directly. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this flexible strategy will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have taken on as their reserve driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
