Just over a full year ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were finally awarded the go-ahead as Formula One’s most recent entry for 2026. Building the team from scratch has required a intense work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport converges on Vegas this weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
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 inaugural time in Melbourne at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the nascent project in early 2023 shortly after it was established, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its core from that point and has a knowing grin when considering the experience.
“You can have a short period reflecting at what you’ve done and say: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you realize: ‘Yes, we still have a great deal to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
The CTO enjoyed success at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning campaigns of 2005 and 2006 and was in charge of technical development at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of introducing the iconic American Cadillac brand, a factory team sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the opportunity to alter cultural approach.”
With each day that passes minds are sharper on the impending decisive point in Australia and targets are being set realistically.
“It's reasonable to expect that any new team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” the team principal noted this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the organization had a statement to make as well.
“The first thing we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “So that we show up and we perform competently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the circuit. After we have demonstrated that our credentials are solid, then we want to show progression from there on.”
Racing Talent and Hiring Drive
In August they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in performing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver reflected the sentiment of fighting spirit.
“Naturally, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We face a mountain of work to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because it is F1. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I am confident with this setup, with this team, these personnel, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”
To realize that ambition recruitment has been in full swing, with staff now reaching more than 400 and scheduled to reach the target of 600 quickly. Alongside their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the midst of finishing an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to build the power unit, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a complex organization, at odds with the direction in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which the CTO alluded.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” remarked Graeme Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We are pragmatic, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. Alright, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes.”
So they have embraced, as opposed to the usual hierarchical system, a non-hierarchical approach similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on distinct elements of the mission in a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their supervisor, that leader talks to a leader somewhere else, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” says the CTO. “We give authority to team members to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for everything is far more efficient and quicker.”
Upcoming Challenges
The effectiveness of this agile approach will be tested in the heat of competition next season and there is a significant degree riding on this for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their reserve driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta
