Approximately one year previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately given the go-ahead as Formula One’s newest entrant for 2026. Building the squad from the ground up has entailed a intense pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport descends on Las Vegas this weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be hosted in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they take to the track for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a monumental challenge, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the newly formed project in early 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a amused expression when considering the ride.
“You can have five minutes reflecting at what the team has achieved and go: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we have built in less than three years,’” he notes. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Yeah, we still have a great deal to do.’”
An Unprecedented Opportunity
The CTO had success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning years of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but nothing has been quite like the challenge of introducing the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a works entry supported by the parent company, GM, into Formula One.
“Establishing an F1 team from nothing, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he says. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to transform organizational mindset.”
With each day that passes thoughts are sharper on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and expectations are being set realistically.
“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is going to be last but merely participating will be an accomplishment in itself,” the team principal stated recently and while Chester shared this view he thought the squad had a statement to make as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “So that we turn up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that we are a serious contender executing the right things on the race track. Once we’ve shown that we’re really credible, then we want to show improvement from there on.”
Pilot Selection and Team Building Effort
In August they contracted Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their racers for the 2026 season, a pair distinguished for their invaluable experience in operating at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver expressed the attitude of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. I am confident with this structure, with these individuals, these people, there is every reason that we can't manage to get relatively quickly to the front and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal staff acquisition has been in full swing, with personnel now reaching over 400 and planned to attain the target of 600 rapidly. In addition to their current base at Silverstone, the team are in the phase of building an headquarters at Fishers, Indiana in Indianapolis and there is the GM works in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the center to manufacture the new engine, set for 2029 – until then they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate structure, different from the direction in Formula One for more centralization, and has led to the innovative team culture to which the CTO referred.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” remarked Lowdon shortly before the British GP in the summer. “We have a clear-eyed view, we understand how tough it is. The deadlines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”
So they have embraced, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of Nasa’s, where there were a variety of project teams all tackling distinct elements of the program across a variety of locations.
“In a system where you follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they report it to their manager, that leader consults a leader somewhere else, it travels back down, it’s super slow,” says Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to take charge. Eliminating management approval for all decisions is far more efficient and more rapid.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this nimble methodology will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix in 2026 and there is a considerable amount at stake for F1, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the young American Colton Herta
