Just over one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last given the go-ahead as F1's newest entry for the 2026 season. Establishing the organization from scratch has required a frenetic pace of work that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on the Vegas strip this weekend, the team know the clock is ticking.
The Countdown to Australia
At the last event of the season to be hosted in the US, with just over a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are cognizant there will never be sufficient time.
The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent operation in the spring of 2023 soon after it was created, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its heart ever since and has a wry smile when reflecting on the ride.
“You can have a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Amazing, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “But then the very next instant you think: ‘Well, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A Unique Opportunity
The CTO had success at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has been quite like the mission of launching the iconic American Cadillac name, a manufacturer-backed entry supported by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.
“Establishing an grand prix team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you don’t get the possibility to alter cultural approach.”
With every day that elapses minds are sharper on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and goals are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any incoming team joining the grid is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he thought the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we aim to demonstrate is that we should be there,” he emphasizes. “So we show up and we perform competently. We want to show that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate improvement after that.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In August they signed Checo Pérez and Bottas as their racers for 2026, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in competing at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver expressed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “We face a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident given this organization, with this group, this staff, it's entirely possible we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in full swing, with employees now up to in excess of 400 and scheduled to attain the goal of 600 members rapidly. Complementing their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the process of building an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are constructing the center to produce the power unit, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will run Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the direction in F1 for greater centralisation, and has inspired the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester referred to.
Space Mission Inspiration
“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo program,” stated Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how tough it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. 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 variety of specialist groups all focusing on various components of the project in a multiple sites.
“In a system where you follow a process where an issue arises and they report it to their manager, that supervisor consults a leader at a different location, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” says Nick Chester. “So we empower team members to handle things directly. Avoiding management approval for all decisions is so much cleaner and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this agile methodology will be evaluated in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a significant degree on the line for F1, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
