Just over twelve months ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the official approval as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from nothing has entailed a hectic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One arrives on Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be hosted in the America, with around three months to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are conscious there will never be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic project in early 2023 soon after it was established, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a knowing grin when thinking about the experience.
“You might get a brief moment looking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we have built in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Task
The CTO had success at the Renault team in Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has been quite like the mission of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a factory team backed by the owner, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Establishing an Formula One team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an established team you rarely get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the looming decisive point in the Australian GP and expectations are being handled.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while the CTO agreed with this sentiment he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we function efficiently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the correct procedures on the track. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Effort
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a duo remarkable for their invaluable experience in operating at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to finish last. I believe with this structure, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we can't manage to get relatively quickly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now at in excess of 400 and intended to hit the target of six hundred swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at the UK base, the squad are in the process of completing an HQ at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – until then they will run Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a complex structure, different from the direction in the sport for increased consolidation, and has inspired the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester alluded.
Space Mission Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” said the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, instead of the conventional chain of command, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of project teams all tackling various components of the mission across a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader talks to a manager in another department, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” says the CTO. “We give authority to people to take charge. Eliminating managerial sign-off for each action is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The efficacy of this agile approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a considerable amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
