Just over twelve months ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately granted the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for 2026. Building the team from the ground up has involved a frenetic pace of work that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One descends on Las Vegas this race weekend, Cadillac know time is getting tight.
The Race Against Time to Melbourne
At the last event of the campaign to be staged in the United States, with just over 100 days to go before they make their debut for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean challenge, they are aware there will never be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the embryonic project in March 2023 soon after it was created, when the team were without even an approved entry. He has been at its center from that point and gets a wry smile when reflecting on the journey.
“You can have a brief moment thinking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Incredible, how impressive what we’ve done in under three years,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you think: ‘Yes, we still have a significant amount to do.’”
A One-of-a-Kind Opportunity
Nick Chester achieved victories at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious seasons of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes electric racing team, but no other project has truly matched the challenge of bringing the all-American Cadillac name, a factory team sponsored by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.
“Building an Formula One team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he observes. “It is like nothing else. In an well-set team you won't have the chance to alter team culture.”
With each day that elapses focus are sharper on the approaching critical moment in Melbourne and targets 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,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Nick Chester agreed with this sentiment he believed the organization had a reputation to build as well.
“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he emphasizes. “So that we show up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the track. When we prove that we’re really credible, then we want to show improvement after that.”
Pilot Selection and Hiring Drive
In the summer they contracted Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their drivers for the 2026 season, a tandem notable for their invaluable experience in competing at the front in two of the sport’s biggest teams, the Red Bull team and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver reflected the sentiment of determined optimism.
“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” he commented. “There’s going to be a massive task to do, and it will likely be probably a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. In my view with this structure, with these individuals, this staff, there is every reason that we won't be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and taste victory.”
To that end recruitment has been in top gear, with staff now up to in excess of 400 and planned to reach the target of 600 quickly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of completing an main base at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to build the new engine, planned for 2029 – for now they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex structure, different from the movement in F1 for more centralization, and has inspired the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.
NASA Blueprint
“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” stated Graeme Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how challenging it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. Well, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have adopted, instead of the traditional management structure, a decentralized management similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of Apollo teams all focusing on distinct elements of the program at a different facilities.
“When you must follow a process where a challenge emerges and they raise it up to their supervisor, that manager talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, the process is very slow,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to handle things directly. Moving away from management approval for everything is so much cleaner and quicker.”
What Lies Ahead
The effectiveness of this nimble approach will be proven in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is a significant degree on the line for Formula One, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
