Just over a full year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally given the green light as the world of Formula One's newest entrant for the 2026 season. Establishing the squad from the ground up has involved a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac understand time is getting tight.
The Countdown to Australia
At the final race of the campaign to be hosted in the United States, with approximately a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are cognizant there will never be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the squad were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart ever since and enjoys a wry smile when reflecting on the experience.
“There might be five minutes looking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what the team has created in under three years,’” he notes. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yeah, there is still a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
The CTO enjoyed success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical direction at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of introducing the all-American Cadillac marque, a works entry backed by the parent company, GM, into F1.
“Creating an Formula One team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you don’t get the possibility to change cultural approach.”
With every day that passes focus are more focused on the looming decisive point in Australia and goals are being handled.
“You have to assume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal commented earlier this year and while Chester echoed this he felt the squad had a point to prove as well.
“Our primary goal we intend to prove is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we show up and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Drive
In late summer they signed Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo remarkable for their invaluable experience in performing at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the attitude of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and it will likely be almost certainly a challenging beginning, because it is F1. But we’re not there to stay at the back. I believe with this setup, with these individuals, these people, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and intended to reach the target of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their existing facility at Silverstone, the squad are in the process of completing an HQ at Fishers in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, where they are developing the facility to build the 2029 engine, scheduled for the 2029 season – until then they will operate with power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the movement in Formula One for greater centralisation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester referred.
Apollo Blueprint
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” stated the team principal just before the British Grand Prix in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have implemented, instead of the traditional management structure, a decentralized management akin to that of the space agency's, where there were a assortment of project teams all focusing on distinct elements of the program across a different facilities.
“In a system where you follow a process where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that manager talks to a supervisor somewhere else, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Chester. “So we empower team members to really get on with it. Avoiding hierarchical consent for each action is far more efficient and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The efficacy of this agile methodology will be tested in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a considerable amount at stake for Formula One, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
