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A little more than one year ago at the Nevada Grand Prix, Cadillac were finally given the green light as the world of Formula One's most recent participant for 2026. Constructing the squad from the ground up has involved a intense operating tempo that the team boss, Graeme Lowdon, has equated to the NASA lunar mission. As the sport descends on Las Vegas this weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.

The Tight Timeline to Melbourne

At the last event of the campaign to be hosted in the US, with approximately 100 days to go before they make their debut for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental endeavor, they are conscious there will never be sufficient time.

The chief technical officer, Nick Chester, joined the embryonic team in March 2023 not long after it was created, when the organization were without even an official entry. He has been at its core from that point and enjoys a knowing grin when thinking about the journey.

“You might get a brief moment looking back at what you’ve done and go: ‘Incredible, what an achievement what the team has created in less than three years,’” Chester states. “And then the next minute you consider: ‘Yeah, we’ve still got a great deal to do.’”

An Unprecedented Task

Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's title-winning campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in command of engineering strategy at the new Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has truly matched the task of launching the iconic American Cadillac name, a factory team supported by the owner, General Motors Corporation, into Formula One.

“Establishing an Formula One team from nothing, how often do you get the opportunity to do that?” Chester remarks. “It is like nothing else. In an existing team you don’t get the opportunity to change team culture.”

With each passing day that goes by thoughts are increasingly concentrated on the approaching moment of truth in the Australian GP and goals are being set realistically.

“One must presume that any new team coming in is likely to start at the back but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon commented this year and while the CTO echoed this he believed the squad had a point to prove as well.

“Our primary goal we want to show is that we deserve to be there,” Chester explains. “So we arrive and we function efficiently. We aim to demonstrate that this is a professional operation executing the proper actions on the track. When we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on forward movement from there on.”

Pilot Selection and Recruitment Push

In late summer they contracted Sergio Perez and Valtteri as their racers for the 2026 season, a duo distinguished for their vast knowledge in competing at the leading positions in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver reflected the attitude of combative optimism.

“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” Bottas stated. “There’s going to be a mountain of work to do, and it’s going to be most likely a difficult start, because it's the top level of motorsport. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I believe with this structure, with this group, this staff, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to progress rapidly to a competitive level and taste victory.”

To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with staff now up to in excess of 400 and scheduled to hit the target of six hundred quickly. Alongside their existing facility at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of completing an HQ at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to manufacture the new engine, planned for the 2029 season – in the meantime they will run Ferrari power units – and the Toyota's wind tunnel in Germany. It is a sophisticated structure, contrary to the movement in F1 for increased consolidation, and has inspired the innovative team culture to which the CTO alluded.

Space Mission Inspiration

“It's closely based on the NASA moon mission,” remarked Graeme Lowdon ahead of the Silverstone race in July. “We have a clear-eyed view, we know how difficult it is. The timelines, they’re super, super, super short. OK, it's not a space expedition, but the pressure is comparable.”

So they have embraced, rather than the traditional management structure, a non-hierarchical approach comparable to that of the space agency's, where there were a range of specialist groups all focusing on distinct elements of the mission in a different facilities.

“When you must follow a protocol where a challenge emerges and they escalate it to their supervisor, that manager consults a supervisor somewhere else, it travels back down, it becomes inefficient,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to handle things directly. Avoiding management approval for everything is far more efficient and faster.”

What Lies Ahead

The efficacy of this agile approach will be evaluated in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is no little amount riding on this for Formula One, too. Cadillac have recruited as their reserve driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta