Just over twelve months in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately granted the go-ahead as Formula One’s newest participant for 2026. Building the organization from the ground up has entailed a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 descends on Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the America, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic operation in the spring of 2023 soon after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and enjoys a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Incredible, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in a short three-year period,’” he says. “But then the following moment you realize: ‘Yes, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Chester enjoyed success at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005/2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into Formula One.
“Building an grand prix team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you rarely get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the approaching moment of truth in the Australian GP and expectations are being set realistically.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is going to be last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated earlier this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he thought the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the circuit. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Push
In late summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a duo notable for their vast knowledge in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with staff now at over 400 and intended to reach the goal of 600 swiftly. Alongside their current base at Silverstone, the organization are in the phase of finishing an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are developing the center to produce the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a intricate structure, contrary to the direction in the sport for greater centralisation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester alluded.
Space Mission Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, instead of the conventional chain of command, a decentralized management similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all tackling distinct elements of the project in a different facilities.
“When you must follow a procedure where an issue arises and they escalate it to their manager, that manager consults a manager at a different location, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” says Nick Chester. “We give authority to team members to really get on with it. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is much smoother and more rapid.”
The Future
The success of this flexible methodology will be evaluated in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their reserve driver the young Californian Colton Herta
