A little more than twelve months previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately granted the go-ahead as F1's most recent entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from nothing has required a hectic work rate that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac are aware time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the season finale of the campaign to be held in the America, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will not be adequate time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent team in March 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center since then and gets a amused expression when reflecting on the ride.
“You can have a brief moment reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we have built in less than three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you realize: ‘Yes, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
The CTO enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has truly matched the mission of introducing the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the owner, GM, into Formula One.
“Establishing an F1 team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you won't have the possibility to alter cultural approach.”
With each passing day that goes by focus are more focused on the approaching decisive point in Melbourne and targets are being handled.
“You have to assume that any incoming team 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 echoed this he thought the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “In order that we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender executing the correct procedures on the track. Once we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on progression after that.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Effort
In the summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a tandem remarkable for their invaluable experience in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Bottas expressed the attitude of fighting spirit.
“Of course, we are pragmatic,” he commented. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be probably a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to remain at the rear. I believe given this organization, with this group, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to advance swiftly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with employees now reaching in excess of 400 and planned to hit the target of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their current base at Silverstone, the organization are in the midst of building an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indy and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, set for 2029 – in the meantime they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex structure, contrary to the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Nick Chester alluded.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” remarked Lowdon shortly before the British GP in mid-season. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on different aspects of the mission in a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their manager, that manager communicates with a leader somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” explains the CTO. “So we empower staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for each action is far more efficient and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this flexible strategy will be tested in the heat of competition next season and there is no little amount at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
