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Just over twelve months ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's newest entrant for 2026. Constructing the squad from the ground up has required a intense operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on Vegas this weekend, the team are aware time is getting tight.

The Race Against Time to Australia

At the final race of the championship to be hosted in the America, with around three months to go before they take to the track for the maiden outing in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have come on in leaps and bounds but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, joined the newly formed project in early 2023 soon after it was formed, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core since then and gets a amused expression when considering the journey.

“There might be five minutes thinking back at what you have accomplished and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what the team has created in under three years,’” he says. “But then the very next instant you realize: ‘Well, there is still a great deal to do.’”

An Unprecedented Challenge

Nick Chester had success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in command of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes electric racing team, but no previous experience has been quite like the task of introducing the all-American Cadillac name, a works entry backed by the owner, GM, into Formula One.

“Creating an F1 team from scratch, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” he says. “There's nothing comparable. In an established team you won't have the chance to change team culture.”

With each day that goes by minds are sharper on the approaching moment of truth in Melbourne and goals are being set realistically.

“One must presume that a brand-new squad coming in is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented recently and while Nick Chester shared this view he thought the team had a point to prove as well.

“Our primary goal we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” he says. “In order that we turn up and we operate well. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the race track. Once we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we want to show forward movement subsequently.”

Driver Lineup and Hiring Push

In late summer they signed Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their racers for 2026, a tandem distinguished for their vast knowledge in performing at the sharp end in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of combative optimism.

“Naturally, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a huge amount of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a difficult start, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to finish last. In my view given this organization, with this group, these people, there’s no reason why we won't be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and achieve good results.”

To that end hiring has been in overdrive, with staff now up to more than 400 and scheduled to reach the goal of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their existing facility at Silverstone, the organization are in the process of completing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indy and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, where they are constructing the plant to manufacture the 2029 engine, set for 2029 – until then they will use power from Ferrari – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne, Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the trend in the sport for greater centralisation, and has prompted the fresh organizational mindset to which Chester alluded.

NASA Model

“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo project,” said Graeme Lowdon just before the British GP in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we recognize how challenging it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. OK, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”

So they have embraced, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of Nasa’s, where there were a range of project teams all focusing on various components of the mission in a variety of locations.

“When you must follow a process where an issue arises and they report it to their manager, that supervisor talks to a manager in another department, it goes back down the chain, it’s super slow,” says Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable staff to really get on with it. Avoiding management approval for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”

Upcoming Challenges

The success of this nimble strategy will be tested in the pressure of racing when the season begins and there is a significant degree riding on this for the sport, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their development driver the emerging American Colton Herta