Just over twelve months ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately granted the green light as Formula One’s most recent entry for 2026. Building the squad from nothing has entailed a intense operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on Vegas this weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Tight Timeline to Australia
At the final race of the season to be held in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic team in the spring of 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart ever since and has a wry smile when reflecting on the ride.
“You can have a short period looking back at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “But then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Alonso's victorious campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Creating an grand prix team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each day that passes minds are sharper on the looming moment of truth in Australia and targets are being handled.
“One must presume that any new team joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal noted recently and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the team had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “So we show up and we function efficiently. We want to show that we’re a proper team doing the right things on the track. When we’ve shown that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In the summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a tandem distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver reflected the mood of determined optimism.
“Of course, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We have a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident with this structure, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we can't manage to progress rapidly up to the pace and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now up to more than 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 quickly. Complementing their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the midst of finishing an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to build the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – until then they will use Ferrari engines – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organization, at odds with the movement in F1 for increased consolidation, and has inspired the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” stated Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British GP in July. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. OK, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on various components of the mission across a multiple sites.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader talks to a manager somewhere else, it is relayed back, the process is very slow,” notes Chester. “So we empower team members to handle things directly. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this agile methodology will be tested in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old Californian Colton Herta
