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A little more than twelve months previously at the Vegas Grand Prix, Cadillac were at last awarded the go-ahead as F1's most recent participant for the 2026 season. Building the squad from nothing has required a hectic operating tempo that the team principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As the sport converges on the Vegas strip this weekend, Cadillac are aware the deadline is approaching.

The Countdown to Australia

At the final race of the season to be staged in the America, with around 100 days to go before they hit the circuit for the inaugural time in Melbourne at the first race of 2026, Cadillac have made significant progress but, in what must seem like a monumental task, they are conscious there will not be sufficient time.

The CTO, Nick Chester, came aboard the nascent team in early 2023 shortly after it was created, when the team were without even an official entry. He has been at its core since then and has a amused expression when considering the journey.

“There might be a short period looking back at what the team has achieved and think: ‘Wow, how impressive what the team has created in a short three-year period,’” he notes. “Then the next minute you realize: ‘Yes, we’ve still got quite a lot to do.’”

An Unprecedented Task

Nick Chester enjoyed success at Renault in the driver Fernando Alonso's victorious campaigns of the mid-2000s and was in control of technical development at the recently formed Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no previous experience has quite compared with the challenge of launching the quintessentially American Cadillac marque, a factory team sponsored by the owner, General Motors, into F1.

“Establishing an grand prix team from the ground up, when are you ever going to get a chance to do that?” Chester remarks. “It's unparalleled. In an established team you rarely get the possibility to alter cultural approach.”

With each day that passes thoughts are more focused on the approaching critical moment in the Australian GP and goals are being handled.

“You have to assume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is probably going to finish last but just making it to the starting line will be an achievement in itself,” Graeme Lowdon noted this year and while Chester agreed with this sentiment he felt the organization had a reputation to build as well.

“The initial objective we want to show is that we should be there,” he says. “In order that we arrive and we operate well. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the circuit. Once we prove that our credentials are solid, then we aim to demonstrate improvement subsequently.”

Pilot Selection and Hiring Drive

In the summer they contracted Checo Pérez and Valtteri as their racers for 2026, a tandem notable for their invaluable experience in operating at the leading positions in two championship-winning squads, Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG, and Valtteri Bottas reflected the mood of fighting spirit.

“Certainly, we have a realistic outlook,” Bottas stated. “We face a mountain of work to do, and we expect probably a difficult start, because it is F1. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident with this setup, with this team, these people, there is every reason that we won't be able to get relatively quickly up to the pace and achieve good results.”

To that end staff acquisition has been in full swing, with staff now at more than 400 and scheduled to hit the objective of six hundred quickly. In addition to their existing facility at the UK base, the squad are in the process of finishing an main base at Fishers in the Indianapolis area and there is the GM plant in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to produce the 2029 engine, scheduled for 2029 – in the meantime they will operate with Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Germany. It is a complex structure, different from the trend in F1 for increased consolidation, and has inspired the new cultural approach to which Chester referred to.

Apollo Model

“We've drawn heavily from the Apollo project,” said Graeme Lowdon shortly before the Silverstone race in July. “We’re realistic, we recognize how tough it is. The timelines, are incredibly tight. Well, we’re not putting a man on the moon, but it can seem that way.”

So they have adopted, as opposed to the traditional management structure, a flat management structure akin to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of specialist groups all working on distinct elements of the project at a variety of locations.

“If you have to go through a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their supervisor, that supervisor consults a manager in another department, it goes back down the chain, it becomes inefficient,” explains the CTO. “So we empower people to really get on with it. Eliminating hierarchical consent for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”

Upcoming Challenges

The success of this agile methodology will be proven in the heat of competition when the season begins and there is no little amount at stake for the sport, too. Cadillac have recruited as their development driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta