Michael Andretti and his Andretti-Cadillac team are only halfway to an official entry into Formula 1. The FIA, F1’s governing body, already approved Andretti but he now needs to be approved by F1 Management (FOM), the sport’s money people. It’s a long road ahead for Andretti but that isn’t stopping his team from wind tunnel-testing their F1 car.
“Our car is actually going to be in a wind tunnel next week, so we have a car already built up in 2023 spec,” Andretti told Sky Sports, at the 2023 F1 Austin Grand Prix in Austin, Texas. Andretti will use Toyota’s Cologne, Germany wind tunnel. While Andretti’s F1 entry is still far from official, the team is eyeing a 2025 season entry.
Despite support from the FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem and several current F1 drivers, several team owners and even F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali have voiced their opposition to an Andretti entry.
“I’m a strong believer that it’s working really well with 10 teams right now, and believe that’s the way it should stay,” said Aston Martin F1 team owner Lawrence Stroll. Most of the other nine F1 team owners agree with Stroll, as they don’t want to split the financial pie 11 ways.
“We have 10 franchises that we hope can increase the value and you are certainly not going to increase the value by issuing new franchises to people who cannot increase the overall value of Formula 1,” said Mercedes owner Toto Wolff.
Andretti disagrees, though, as he feels the money his team would bring in would offset any money lost from an additional team coming in. “They say we are slicing the pie but I think the point is we hopefully bring in more than what we take away and we really believe that. We think we are going to add to it and not take away from it.”
Andretti isn’t backing down and is working under the assumption that his team will race in F1 soon. “We’re flat out, we’re building a team. At the moment it’s 2025, could be 2026, but we’ll see.”
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