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Just over one year ago at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last granted the official approval as Formula One’s newest entrant for 2026. Building the team from nothing has entailed a intense operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.

The Countdown to Australia

At the final race of the season to be held in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending challenge, they are conscious there will not be enough hours in the day.

The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic project in March 2023 not long after it was established, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its heart from that point and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.

“There might be five minutes looking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Wow, isn’t this fantastic what we have built in a short three-year period,’” Chester states. “Then the next minute you think: ‘Yes, we still have a great deal to do.’”

An Unprecedented Challenge

Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious seasons of the mid-2000s and was in command of technical development at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the mission of bringing the all-American Cadillac brand, a works entry sponsored by the parent company, General Motors Corporation, into the pinnacle of motorsport.

“Establishing an Formula One team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to alter organizational mindset.”

With each passing day that elapses minds are increasingly concentrated on the looming moment of truth in Melbourne and expectations are being set realistically.

“One must presume that a brand-new squad joining the grid is probably going to finish last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted earlier this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the squad had a statement to make as well.

“The initial objective we intend to prove is that we belong on the grid,” he emphasizes. “In order that we show up and we function efficiently. We want to show that this is a professional operation doing the proper actions on the race track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we will focus on improvement from there on.”

Racing Talent and Recruitment Effort

In the summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their drivers for the 2026 season, a pair notable for their invaluable experience in competing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and Mercedes-AMG, and the Finnish driver echoed the sentiment of fighting spirit.

“Of course, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “We face a massive task to do, and it’s going to be almost certainly a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I believe with this setup, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we can't manage to progress rapidly to the front and enjoy some success.”

To that end hiring has been in overdrive, with employees now at in excess of 400 and planned to hit the goal of 600 members rapidly. Alongside their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the organization are in the process of finishing an HQ at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are developing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Cologne. It is a sophisticated structure, different from the trend in F1 for increased consolidation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester alluded.

Apollo Inspiration

“It's closely based on the Apollo program,” stated Graeme Lowdon ahead of the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We’re realistic, we understand how tough it is. The schedules, are extremely compressed. 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 non-hierarchical approach similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all focusing on different aspects of the project in a variety of locations.

“In a system where you follow a procedure where someone has a problem and they report it to their team leader, that supervisor communicates with a supervisor in another department, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable people to take charge. Eliminating hierarchical consent for everything is so much cleaner and quicker.”

What Lies Ahead

The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be evaluated in the intensity of Grand Prix when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for F1, too. The Cadillac team have taken on as their development driver the emerging Californian Colton Herta