A little more than twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately given the official approval as the world of Formula One's latest entrant for 2026. Establishing the squad from the ground up has involved a hectic work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 converges on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the America, with around 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are aware there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in the spring of 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core since then and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the ride.
“There might be a short period looking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we’ve done in under three years,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical development at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the challenge of launching the all-American Cadillac marque, a factory team sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you don’t get the opportunity to change cultural approach.”
With each day that passes focus are sharper on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and goals are being handled.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated this year and while Chester echoed this he thought the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the proper actions on the race track. Once we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Racing Talent and Team Building Effort
In August they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem distinguished for their priceless expertise in operating at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We face a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe with this structure, with this team, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and taste victory.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with personnel now up to in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of six hundred rapidly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the phase of finishing an HQ at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to produce the power unit, set for 2029 – for now they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” said Lowdon ahead of the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how tough it is. The schedules, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, rather than the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all working on distinct elements of the program at a different facilities.
“If you have to go through a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their team leader, that manager consults a leader in another department, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” says the CTO. “So we empower staff to take charge. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is far more efficient and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this flexible methodology will be proven in the pressure of racing next season and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
