Just over a full year in the past at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the green light as the world of Formula One's latest entry for the 2026 season. Building the organization from scratch has required a frenetic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the final race of the season to be staged in the United States, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed operation in early 2023 soon after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart since then and has a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“There might be a brief moment looking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “And then the very next instant you think: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
The CTO achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of launching the all-American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to alter cultural approach.”
With each passing day that goes by thoughts 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 joining the grid is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal stated recently and while Nick Chester shared this view he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.
“Our primary goal we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the right things on the circuit. After we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we want to show forward movement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Push
In the summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their priceless expertise in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We have a mountain of work to do, and we expect most likely a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But we’re not there to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this team, this staff, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in overdrive, with staff now up to over 400 and intended to reach the target of 600 members quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at the UK base, the team are in the midst of completing an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are developing the center to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate organisation, at odds with the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which the CTO alluded.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” stated the team principal ahead of the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, rather than the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of specialist groups all focusing on different aspects of the mission across a variety of locations.
“If you have to go through a protocol where someone has a problem and they report it to their supervisor, that leader consults a supervisor at a different location, it goes back down the chain, the process is very slow,” explains Nick Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Eliminating management approval for all decisions is much smoother and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this agile approach will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a significant degree on the line for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their reserve driver the young Californian Colton Herta
