Just over one year previously at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were ultimately given the go-ahead as Formula One’s most recent entry for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from scratch has required a frenetic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on the Vegas strip this race weekend, Cadillac understand the deadline is approaching.
The Countdown to Melbourne
At the final race of the championship to be held in the US, with around 100 days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Australia at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.
The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic team in early 2023 not long after it was created, when the organization were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart ever since and has a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.
“There might be a brief moment reflecting at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, how impressive what we have built in under three years,’” he notes. “Then the following moment you consider: ‘Well, there is still a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
Chester had success at Renault in Alonso's victorious seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical development at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of introducing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, GM, into Formula One.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you rarely get the possibility to alter team culture.”
With each day that goes by minds are sharper on the impending critical moment in the Australian GP and expectations are being managed.
“One must presume that any new team coming in is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon stated this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the team had a point to prove as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the right things on the track. After we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate progression subsequently.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Push
In the summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a pair remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the front in two championship-winning squads, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the mood of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he said. “We face a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to stay at the back. In my view with this structure, with this group, this staff, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to advance swiftly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To that end recruitment has been in overdrive, with personnel now up to over 400 and intended to reach the objective of 600 swiftly. Alongside their existing facility at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the phase of completing an main base at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the center to build the power unit, scheduled for the 2029 season – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the movement in Formula One for more centralization, and has led to the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.
NASA Model
“We've drawn heavily from the NASA moon mission,” said Graeme Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we recognize how difficult it is. The timelines, are extremely compressed. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”
So they have adopted, rather than the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure similar to that of NASA's, where there were a variety of Apollo teams all working on various components of the program at a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a process where an issue arises and they report it to their team leader, that leader consults a supervisor at a different location, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” says Chester. “So we empower staff to really get on with it. Avoiding hierarchical consent for each action is much smoother and faster.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this agile methodology will be tested in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a significant degree riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their development driver the young Californian Colton Herta
