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Just over one year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the green light as Formula One’s newest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from the ground up has required a intense work rate that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has likened to the Apollo moon landing. As Formula One converges on the Vegas strip this race weekend, the team understand the clock is ticking.

The Countdown to Melbourne

At the final race of the campaign to be hosted in the United States, with just over three months to go before they hit the circuit for the maiden outing in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending task, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, became part of the newly formed project in March 2023 shortly after it was formed, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and gets a knowing grin when thinking about the ride.

“There might be five minutes looking back at what you’ve done and say: ‘Amazing, what an achievement what the team has created in less than three years,’” Chester states. “Then the very next instant you realize: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”

An Unprecedented Opportunity

Nick Chester had success at the Renault team in Alonso's title-winning years of 2005 and 2006 and was in command of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but nothing has quite compared with the mission of bringing the iconic American Cadillac marque, a factory team backed by the corporate entity, General Motors Corporation, into F1.

“Establishing an Formula One team from scratch, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” he observes. “There's nothing comparable. In an existing team you don’t get the chance to alter cultural approach.”

With every day that passes thoughts are more focused on the looming decisive point in Melbourne and expectations are being managed.

“It's reasonable to expect that any incoming team entering the sport is probably going to finish last but merely participating will be an feat in itself,” Graeme Lowdon stated recently and while Nick Chester shared this view he felt the team had a point to prove as well.

“The initial objective we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we turn up and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that we are a serious contender performing the correct procedures on the race track. After we prove that we’re really credible, then we aim to demonstrate progression after that.”

Racing Talent and Hiring Effort

In the summer they signed Checo Pérez and Valtteri Bottas as their drivers for 2026, a duo remarkable for their priceless expertise in performing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and Valtteri Bottas expressed the attitude of combative optimism.

“Naturally, we’re realistic,” he commented. “We have a huge amount of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because it's the top level of motorsport. But we aren't joining to finish last. I believe with this structure, with this team, these personnel, there is every reason that we won't be able to advance swiftly to a competitive level and taste victory.”

To achieve that goal recruitment has been in full swing, with personnel now reaching more than 400 and intended to attain the target of 600 quickly. Alongside their present headquarters at Silverstone, the squad are in the midst of completing an HQ at the Fishers location in Indianapolis and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are building the center to build the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – for now they will use Ferrari power units – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne, Germany. It is a intricate structure, at odds with the trend in the sport for more centralization, and has prompted the new cultural approach to which Chester alluded.

Apollo Inspiration

“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” said the team principal shortly before the British Grand Prix in the summer. “We’re realistic, we recognize how difficult it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. Alright, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but it feels like it sometimes.”

So they have implemented, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure similar to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of Apollo teams all working on various components of the project in a variety of locations.

“In a system where you follow a procedure where an issue arises and they escalate it to their manager, that manager talks to a manager at a different location, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” notes Nick Chester. “We give authority to people to take charge. Eliminating hierarchical consent for each action is far more efficient and quicker.”

The Future

The efficacy of this agile methodology will be proven in the intensity of Grand Prix next season and there is a considerable amount riding on this for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have recruited as their test driver the emerging American Colton Herta