Just over one year ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for 2026. Building the squad from nothing has involved a intense pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As the sport arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, the team are aware the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the final race of the season to be held in the America, with approximately a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent operation in March 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and enjoys a wry smile when reflecting on the journey.
“You can have a brief moment reflecting at what you’ve done and think: ‘Incredible, how impressive what the team has created in under three years,’” Chester states. “Then the following moment you consider: ‘Yeah, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
An Unprecedented Challenge
Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in control of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but nothing has been quite like the challenge of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a factory team supported by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you don’t get the opportunity to alter team culture.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the impending decisive point in the Australian GP and expectations are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team entering the sport is going to be last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Chester shared this view he thought the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender performing the proper actions on the circuit. Once we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Hiring Effort
In August they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem remarkable for their invaluable experience in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas echoed the sentiment of determined optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I believe with this structure, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to advance swiftly to a competitive level and enjoy some success.”
To that end recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now at over 400 and intended to reach the objective of 600 quickly. Complementing their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the plant to produce the new engine, set for 2029 – in the meantime they will operate with Ferrari power units – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated organization, different from the movement in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred.
Apollo Model
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we understand how challenging it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of specialist groups all working on various components of the project across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where someone has a problem and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager talks to a leader somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” notes Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Eliminating management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this nimble approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a considerable amount at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have taken on as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta
