Approximately a full year previously at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the green light as Formula One’s newest entry for 2026. Building the team from scratch has involved a frenetic pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One arrives on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team understand time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the season finale of the season to be staged in the US, with approximately three months to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are conscious there will never be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed team in early 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and has a wry smile when thinking about the experience.
“There might be a short period reflecting at what you’ve done and think: ‘Wow, what an achievement what the team has created in under three years,’” he notes. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
Chester had success at Renault in Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has been quite like the challenge of introducing the all-American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the owner, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building an Formula One team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you rarely get the possibility to alter team culture.”
With each day that passes minds are sharper on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and targets are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any incoming team coming in is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while Chester shared this view he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So that we arrive and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the race track. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we will focus on forward movement subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Drive
In late summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a duo distinguished for their vast knowledge in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and Mercedes, and the Finnish driver reflected the attitude of determined optimism.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We face a massive task to do, and it’s going to be most likely a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this team, these people, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly to the front and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now at over 400 and intended to reach the objective of six hundred quickly. Complementing their present headquarters at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of building an headquarters at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are constructing the center to build the power unit, set for 2029 – until then they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the direction in F1 for more centralization, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which the CTO referred.
NASA Model
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” stated the team principal shortly before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. Well, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a flat management structure similar to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all working on various components of the mission across a multiple sites.
“If you have to go through a protocol where an issue arises and they raise it up to their manager, that supervisor communicates with a manager at a different location, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” notes Chester. “So we empower staff to take charge. Moving away from managerial sign-off for everything is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta
