Approximately one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately given the official approval as Formula One’s most recent participant for the 2026 season. Constructing the team from nothing has involved a intense operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on Vegas this race weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the last event of the championship to be hosted in the America, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent project in early 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart from that point and enjoys a amused expression when considering the journey.
“You might get a brief moment reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Task
The CTO achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has quite compared with the task of launching the all-American Cadillac marque, a factory team sponsored by the owner, GM, into F1.
“Building an Formula One team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to change team culture.”
With each passing day that goes by thoughts are more focused on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that a brand-new squad coming in is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” the team principal stated earlier this year and while Nick Chester shared this view he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team performing the correct procedures on the race track. Once we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate forward movement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Effort
In the summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver reflected the mood of fighting spirit.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We face a massive task to do, and we expect almost certainly a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I believe with this structure, with this group, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly to the front and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now up to over 400 and scheduled to reach the goal of 600 rapidly. In addition to their present headquarters at the UK base, the team are in the midst of finishing an headquarters at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are building the center to produce the power unit, planned for 2029 – for now they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex structure, at odds with the direction in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal just before the British GP in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. OK, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all working on different aspects of the mission at a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a procedure where an issue arises and they report it to their team leader, that leader talks to a leader in another department, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to take charge. Eliminating management approval for each action is far more efficient and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this flexible approach will be proven in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
