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A little more than a full year in the past at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were at last awarded the green light as Formula One’s latest entrant for the 2026 season. Constructing the squad from scratch has involved a hectic operating tempo that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the NASA lunar mission. As F1 arrives on Vegas this race weekend, the team understand time is getting tight.

The Countdown to Melbourne

At the final race of the championship to be held in the US, with just over a hundred days to go before they take to the track for the inaugural time in Australia at the 2026 season opener, the Cadillac F1 project have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a never-ending endeavor, they are aware there will not be enough hours in the day.

The technical director, Nick Chester, came aboard the embryonic operation in early 2023 shortly after it was established, when the team were without even an confirmed place. He has been at its heart since then and enjoys a knowing grin when reflecting on the experience.

“There might be five minutes reflecting at what you have accomplished and think: ‘Wow, what an achievement what we have built in less than three years,’” Chester states. “But then the next minute you think: ‘Yes, we’ve still got a significant amount to do.’”

A One-of-a-Kind Task

Chester had success at the Renault team in Fernando Alonso’s victorious years of the mid-2000s and was in charge of technical direction at the recently formed Mercedes Formula E team, but no previous experience has been quite like the mission of bringing the all-American Cadillac brand, a manufacturer-backed entry backed by the corporate entity, GM, into F1.

“Building an F1 team from nothing, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” he says. “It's unparalleled. In an well-set team you don’t get the opportunity to change team culture.”

With each day that goes by focus are more focused on the looming critical moment in Melbourne and expectations are being handled.

“One must presume that any incoming team coming in is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an feat in itself,” the team principal noted recently and while Nick Chester shared this view he believed the organization had a statement to make as well.

“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” Chester explains. “In order that we arrive and we perform competently. We aim to demonstrate that we’re a proper team performing the proper actions on the track. After we’ve shown that our credentials are solid, then we will focus on progression from there on.”

Pilot Selection and Recruitment Drive

In the summer they recruited Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for 2026, a tandem notable for their priceless expertise in performing at the sharp end in two of the sport’s biggest teams, Red Bull Racing and the Mercedes team, and the Finnish driver expressed the sentiment of fighting spirit.

“Certainly, we’re realistic,” he said. “We have a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But we aren't joining to stay at the back. I believe given this organization, with this group, this staff, there is every reason that we shouldn’t be able to get relatively quickly to the front and achieve good results.”

To that end recruitment has been in top gear, with personnel now reaching over 400 and planned to hit the objective of 600 members swiftly. Alongside their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the process of finishing an HQ at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are constructing the plant to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – until then they will operate with Ferrari power units – and the Toyota wind tunnel in Germany. It is a intricate organisation, different from the direction in the sport for greater centralisation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Chester referred to.

Space Mission Inspiration

“It's closely based on the Apollo project,” said Lowdon just before the Silverstone race in the summer. “We are pragmatic, we know how difficult it is. The deadlines, are extremely compressed. Alright, it's not a space expedition, but it can seem that way.”

So they have adopted, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a decentralized management similar to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of project teams all tackling distinct elements of the mission at a multiple sites.

“In a system where you follow a procedure where an issue arises and they escalate it to their manager, that manager talks to a leader somewhere else, it is relayed back, it’s super slow,” explains the CTO. “Therefore we enable team members to take charge. Moving away from management approval for each action is far more efficient and more rapid.”

What Lies Ahead

The success of this nimble strategy will be tested in the pressure of racing in 2026 and there is no little amount riding on this for the sport, too. Cadillac have signed as their reserve driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta