Bonus Blog - General Motors to F1 After All (Patreon)

A sneak peak at tomorrow's post: 

This is another one of those stories where you just roll your eyes in frustration over just how stupid we’ve all been about it in the world that is F1. 

So, in case you missed it, according to the Associated Press (Hi Jenna), F1 could be set to approve an 11th team into F1 as early as next week, and yes, it’s the Andretti bid, but not as we know it. Kinda. 

So it turns out that new CEO and leader of the day-to-day at Andretti, Dan Towriss (Formerly of Gainbridge) has been able to sit down with Formula One Management. It may be coincidental, but this is within the same week that Greg Maffei announced he was stepping down as CEO of Liberty Media, F1’s commercial owners.

Now, it’s worth noting here that according to everyone who matters in the media space, there isn’t too much that’s actually changing about the Andretti bid that’s led to this change of heart. General Motors are going to have more of their name on the front, likely through their Cadillac sub-brand alongside their power units in 2028. According to The Race, the Andretti branding prominence is set to go down, maybe even disappear altogether when the official entry is listed. But Andretti are still going to be the nuts and bolts of the operation beyond that. They’ve already built their two facilities in Silverstone and Indianapolis and have their chassis in the works via their time using Toyota’s windtunnel in Cologne. 

As far as I can tell, the only real reason everything has changed, is because Michael Andretti has stepped down from the day-to-day running of Andretti, and it seems he was the figure creating the impasse. 

Michael’s approach to getting into F1 has certainly been bullish from Day 1. He rocked up in the middle of the Miami GP last year waving around petitions and trying to convince teams that he was going to add value to the grid. This apparently didn’t go down well with a lot of the other team bosses, and F1 CEO Stefano Domenicalli openly criticising their approach. It likely didn’t help when Michael’s father Mario took an invite to sit in front of Congress to claim their bid was being blocked by the sport. The Department of Justice promptly opened an investigation as a result. All this while most of the team owners have been dismissive of a move, such as Toto Wolff’s excuses about track facilities, or James Vowles’ impassioned speech on Sky last year about Williams and its 900 mouths to feed. The team bosses, acting like a cartel, allegedly told  General Motors to buddy up with someone else. Even Mohammed Ben Sulayem, the FIA President who green lit the bid changed his stance and encouraged Andretti to buy a team instead. 

The fact that the U-Turn from Formula One Management was this swift, to the point where they might be approved before the season ends says to be this was just a petty ploy to make sure Michael wasn’t in the picture anymore. Because little else besides that makes sense as to why everyone’s suddenly now cool with this. Even the team bosses have softened their stance, with the obvious: “Well, if they add value, we’re all for it!”

It makes the last year feel like an outstanding waste of time. What this says to me was, that this was never about the money pot and the fear it was being divided by 11 instead of 10. It was never about the fear of increased competition, or raising the anti-dilution fee to compensate for it. Andretti got what the teams and the sport wanted - Factory backing, from an American market they’re desperate to crack, and from one of the biggest car manufacturers on earth, and they were prepared to still say no unless Andretti himself stepped back. This shit is pettier than Richard. 

Millions of dollars, months of time and progress and potential excitement have been wasted over this. Over something that objectively has everyone winning. The fans get more competition and drivers to care about. The teams get more value for their slice of the pie, even if it's a little smaller to begin with, and they’ll have extra cash in their pockets to compensate for that too. The sport gets a truly American team that wants to lean on that heritage (Unlike Haas), as F1 pushes as hard as it has for the last half decade to try and gain a foothold against NASCAR’s market share. There was never really a drawback to all of this, and THIS was why it was on the brink of collapse? 

Please, please don’t like my dumb sport. Go watch IMSA instead or something.