Just over one year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally granted the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Building the team from the ground up has involved a hectic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac are aware the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Australia
At the last event of the championship to be staged in the United States, with approximately 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are cognizant there will not be enough hours in the day.
The technical director, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed team in March 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core since then and has a knowing grin when considering the journey.
“You can have a short period looking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what we’ve done in under three years,’” he says. “And then the following moment you realize: ‘Well, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”
A Unique Task
Chester enjoyed success at Renault in Fernando Alonso’s championship-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of bringing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a works entry sponsored by the owner, General Motors, into the pinnacle of motorsport.
“Building an F1 team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to change cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses minds are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in the Australian GP and targets are being handled.
“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team coming in is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated earlier this year and while the CTO echoed this he believed the squad had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we want to show is that we should be there,” Chester explains. “So that we arrive and we function efficiently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the right things on the race track. Once we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Push
In late summer they recruited Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their priceless expertise in operating at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas echoed the mood of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” Bottas stated. “We face a massive task to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because it is F1. But we’re not there to stay at the back. In my view given this organization, with this team, these personnel, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition staff acquisition has been in overdrive, with employees now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to reach the objective of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the process of building an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, set for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated organisation, different from the trend in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has led to the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” remarked Graeme Lowdon ahead of the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure similar to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of project teams all focusing on different aspects of the project at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their supervisor, that manager talks to a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” says Chester. “So we empower people to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for everything is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this flexible strategy will be evaluated in the heat of competition in 2026 and there is a considerable amount riding on this for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta
