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Approximately one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the official approval as F1's newest participant for the 2026 season. Building the squad from the ground up has entailed a hectic work rate that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport arrives on Las Vegas this weekend, Cadillac know time is getting tight.

The Tight Timeline to Melbourne

At the season finale of the championship to be held in the America, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Australia at the first race of 2026, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a sisyphean task, they are aware there will not be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent team in the spring of 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the squad were without even an official entry. He has been at its core ever since and has a knowing grin when reflecting on the journey.

“You might get five minutes thinking back at what the team has achieved and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what we have built in under three years,’” Chester states. “But then the very next instant you consider: ‘Well, we still have quite a lot to do.’”

A One-of-a-Kind Challenge

Chester achieved victories at Renault in Alonso's championship-winning seasons of 2005/2006 and was in charge of technical direction at the then-new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has been quite like the task of bringing the quintessentially American Cadillac brand, a factory team supported by the corporate entity, GM, into the pinnacle of motorsport.

“Establishing an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “It's unparalleled. In an existing team you rarely get the possibility to change cultural approach.”

With each passing day that passes thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the impending decisive point in the Australian GP and expectations are being set realistically.

“You have to assume that any new team entering the sport is likely to start at the back but simply getting on to the grid will be an achievement in itself,” Lowdon commented earlier this year and while the CTO echoed this he felt the team had a point to prove as well.

“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “In order that we turn up and we operate well. We seek to prove that we’re a proper team doing the proper actions on the track. Once we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on improvement from there on.”

Pilot Selection and Hiring Push

In late summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Valtteri as their pilots for the 2026 season, a duo distinguished for their priceless expertise in competing at the leading positions in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the attitude of determined optimism.

“Of course, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “We face a massive task to do, and it’s going to be most likely a tough opening, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we’re not there to finish last. I am confident with this structure, with this team, this staff, it's entirely possible we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and taste victory.”

To achieve that goal hiring has been in full swing, with employees now at more than 400 and intended to attain the objective of six hundred rapidly. Alongside their current base at the Silverstone circuit, the team are in the phase of building an main base at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the facility to build the new engine, set for the 2029 season – until then they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a complex organisation, at odds with the direction in the sport for greater centralisation, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which the CTO referred to.

NASA Model

“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” stated Graeme Lowdon just before the British Grand Prix in July. “We’re realistic, we recognize how tough it is. The deadlines, are incredibly tight. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”

So they have adopted, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a variety of specialist groups all focusing on distinct elements of the mission in a variety of locations.

“When you must follow a procedure where an issue arises and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager talks to a leader in another department, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Avoiding hierarchical consent for each action is so much cleaner and faster.”

What Lies Ahead

The effectiveness of this agile strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing next season and there is a significant degree riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta