Just over one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately given the official approval as Formula One’s latest participant for the 2026 season. Building the squad from nothing has entailed a intense operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, the team understand the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be held in the US, with around 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and has a knowing grin when thinking about the experience.
“You might get five minutes looking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he notes. “But then the following moment you think: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's victorious campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has quite compared with the task of bringing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a works entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.
“Creating an Formula One team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you rarely get the opportunity to transform cultural approach.”
With every day that passes minds are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is likely to start at the back but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon commented recently and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we arrive and we perform competently. We want to show that we’re a proper team performing the right things on the track. Once we have demonstrated that we’re really credible, then we want to show forward movement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a duo remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver reflected the mood of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he said. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But we’re not there to finish last. I am confident given this organization, with these individuals, these people, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and intended to attain the goal of 600 members quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at the UK base, the organization are in the process of finishing an main base at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are constructing the center to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will run power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex structure, different from the movement in the sport for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” said the team principal just before the Silverstone race in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how challenging it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, instead of the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all working on distinct elements of the mission across a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a protocol where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader consults a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “So we empower staff to take charge. Moving away from managerial sign-off for all decisions is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The efficacy of this agile strategy will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
