Approximately one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally granted the go-ahead as Formula One’s newest participant for 2026. Building the organization from nothing has required a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on Las Vegas this race weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be staged in the America, with just over a hundred days to go before they hit the circuit 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 challenge, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the nascent team 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 heart from that point and has a wry smile when thinking about the ride.
“You can have a brief moment thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what we have built in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you consider: ‘Well, there is still a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Chester achieved victories at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has truly matched the mission of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Building an Formula One team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the chance to change cultural approach.”
With each passing day that passes minds are more focused on the impending moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is going to be last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “In order that we turn up and we operate well. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the track. Once we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Team Building Effort
In the summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair notable for their vast knowledge in operating at the sharp end in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident with this setup, with these individuals, this staff, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now up to over 400 and planned to hit the objective of 600 members swiftly. Alongside their current base at the UK base, the team are in the phase of building an main base at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the facility to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate organisation, different from the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Nick Chester alluded.
Apollo Inspiration
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon shortly before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how difficult it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have implemented, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a decentralized management similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of specialist groups all tackling different aspects of the project in a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” notes Chester. “We give authority to staff to take charge. Avoiding managerial sign-off for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”
The Future
The efficacy of this nimble methodology will be tested in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their reserve driver the emerging American Colton Herta
