Just over twelve months ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the green light as the world of Formula One's newest participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the team from the ground up has required a frenetic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport converges on Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the season finale of the season to be staged in the United States, with just over a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are cognizant there will not be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic project in early 2023 not long after it was formed, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core since then and has a wry smile when considering the ride.
“You might get a short period reflecting at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “Then the very next instant you consider: ‘Yes, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the mission of bringing the all-American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the owner, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from the ground up, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you rarely get the opportunity to change team culture.”
With every day that passes minds are increasingly concentrated on the looming critical moment in the Australian GP and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any new team joining the grid is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So that we show up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the circuit. When we prove that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on forward movement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Effort
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver expressed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and we expect probably a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. I believe with this setup, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now at in excess of 400 and planned to hit the objective of 600 members swiftly. In addition to their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the squad are in the midst of completing an HQ at Fishers, Indiana in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to build the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – for now they will use Ferrari power units – and the aerodynamic facility in Germany. It is a intricate organisation, contrary to the direction in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred to.
Space Mission Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” remarked Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a range of specialist groups all working on various components of the program across a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they report it to their team leader, that manager communicates with a leader at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to really get on with it. Moving away from management approval for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this agile strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing 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
