It feels like it was just Tuesday that I was celebrating the ascendancy of Formula 1 in the United States with a bunch of beautiful people in Manhattan. Because it was just Tuesday. And what has F1 done? Decided to insult freakin’ Mario Andretti, General Motors, and thereby all of America. And, yes, the news of the day is that multi-champ Lewis Hamilton is going to rival Ferrari but let’s not get distracted folks. We have been insulted!
To borrow a phrase from Edith Wharton, life makes ugly faces at you sometimes. That’s from Wharton’s book about a bunch of Americans who find themselves dealing with snooty Europeans. The more things change… I suppose. In this case, the ugly faces are those of Formula One which is owned by an American company but is utterly dominated by bitchy European teams run by soap opera jerks.
All seemed like it was going well. The 10-team championship opened the door to the addition of new teams and a combo of Andretti Motorsports and General Motors came together to say they wanted in, and they wanted in for 2025. This seemed like a great idea. F1 is becoming an increasingly American sport, but pretty lacking in American teams, other than the also-ran Haas which has been a better source of comic relief than actual national pride.
You can read the entire statement over on Motorsport.com if you’re curious, but here’s the bit that has everyone mad as hell:
While the Andretti name carries some recognition for F1 fans, our research indicates that F1 would bring value to the Andretti brand rather than the other way around.
Now you’ve done it. Someone hold me back. The response from American fans has been livid, especially given the mix of cars and teams in the current F1 including such storied names as Stake F1 Kick Sauber, which is literally named for a crappy ersatz Twitch streaming platform. I’m sorry that Andretti and Cadillac don’t have the same beneficial cultural capital and racing lineage as Visa Cash App RB F1, the real name of a real team this year.
Get fucked. Get so fucked. Get fucked by a KERS flywheel one time for every lap Max Verstappen led last year. You want us to pay untold money to drag our asses out to Las Vegas, but you can’t give us one good team?
Acceptable new F1 entrants:
CNC Machine company
Honda shoving an engine in a 3 year old Arrows for Takuma Sato
Totally legit supercar maker Marussia
Guy named Walter Wolf
A scam computer that predicts the stock marketUnacceptable new F1 entrants:
Andretti and General Motors— Travis Okulski (@tokulski) January 31, 2024
Drive to Survive became the gateway drug into motorsports via F1. Blocking Andretti and Cadillac from competing in the sport was the sobering moment for many. Congrats to IndyCar and IMSA for keeping the racing strong… the fans are seeing it.
— JF Musial (@jfmusial) February 1, 2024
It wasn’t too long ago that there were sub standard entities like Caterham and Manor-Marussia running around at the back of the grid but F1 feels rejecting global, iconic brands such as Andretti & GM is a prudent move … hmmm ???? https://t.co/RctdqGm916
— Leigh Diffey (@leighdiffey) January 31, 2024
I'm devastated. I won't say anything else because I can't find any other words besides devastated. pic.twitter.com/UaFBC5n9qF
— Mario Andretti (@MarioAndretti) January 31, 2024
You made Mario Andretti stop talking! Mario Andretti loves talking. You pricks.
Are there some quasi-reasonable points that F1 made about GM not being a powertrain supplier and the cars changing next year, which would make Andretti’s team less competitive? Sort of, but those arguments don’t really hold water when you think of all the shitass programs and shitass teams that have run over the last few years, not to mention in the past.
So why is this happening? We got a preview of this from the FIA and its president Mohammed Ben Sulayem, who suggested people (whose names probably rhyme with Bobo Voolf) were unhappy about the prospect of GM getting in there last summer:
.@Cadillac @FollowAndretti @GM @FIA @F1 pic.twitter.com/ziVL91FCec
— Mohammed Ben Sulayem (@Ben_Sulayem) January 8, 2023
F1 operates on a split pot with the teams at the top getting the most money and the teams at the bottom getting the least. With the sport becoming more popular, especially in America, there’s more money to go around but adding a new team would dilute that pot. What’s crazy about this is that Andretti would have had to essentially pay a fee to cover the difference and a lot of this new money is coming from fans in the United States. The whole thing sucks.
Oh, yeah, in what is super weird timing, both Mercedes and Ferrari announced that Lewis Hamilton, who won six championships with Mercedes, is going to Ferrari next year:
Team Statement
Scuderia Ferrari is pleased to announce that Lewis Hamilton will be joining the team in 2025, on a multi-year contract. pic.twitter.com/moEMqUgzXH
— Scuderia Ferrari (@ScuderiaFerrari) February 1, 2024
The timing of this is weird because these announcements usually happen in the middle or end of the season, not more than a year ahead of time. Sucks to be Carlos Sainz I guess!
Don’t let the news distract you. Rage, rage against the F1 machine! F1 said that Andretti should focus on joining in 2028 when it can provide a power unit, so I say let’s skip F1 for the next three years and instead enjoy IMSA, IndyCar, WRC, V8 Supercars, and NASCAR. If they don’t want us we don’t want them and there’s plenty of great racing to go around.
This article was “researched” by reading a bunch of angry tweets, without even reading the entire fucking Liberty Media release.
If he did that, he would’ve find out the F1 teams had nothing to do with LibM’s decision. Sure, some of those teams weren’t thrilled about a new team, but in the end this was Liberty Media’s decision, based on GM not being an actual engine supplier until 2028 (so they would’ve had to force Renault to supply an engine to Andretti, which Renault wasn’t very happy about, sharing engineering data with GM engineers) and the drastic rules changes in 2026 (aka having to develop two brand new F1 cars in 2 years by a brand new team).
So to recap, the FIA was ok with the new Andretti team, the (mostly european) F1 teams were not, but they weren’t asked yet, and the American F1 rights owner (Liberty Media) shut it down until 2028 (when, according to Andretti, GM would become an actual engine supplier). But I guess that reality doesn’t channel uninformed rage in the keyboard warriors, and less engagement is bad for the views count.
Did the Autopian suddenly become part of Gizmodo Media?
Oh, bullshit. While they weren’t directly involved, it’s ridiculous to think that the other teams’ opinion on it carried zero weight while Liberty Media was making the decision.
The rest of your reasoning is just kinda ridiculous. Why is GM not becoming an engine manufacturer until ’28 carry such weight?
Also, Renault’s opinion (which I haven’t seen expressed anywhere other than this comment) should carry zero weight, because that’s the way the rules work, and Renault has done zero to get more customers already in the field because their engine is clearly the worst offering and has been for the entire hybrid era. Guess what happens when you make shit? You get fewer customers.
I see, so the official statement from Liberty Media (the people who actually made the decision) is ‘bullshit’, but your feelings are what really matter. It’s all in line with the whole screed, so it tracks 🙂
Mario and GM,i dont know why you’d want to join that amoral money pit pretending to be a race series.Take this as the dodged bullet that it is!!
f1 has soooooo much wrong with it.I could go on for an hour.It’s just wrong in so many ways.
Even if you are successful,you’ll be associated with f1’s fan base who are either rich and vacuous or terminally angry and stupid.Go check out an f1 forum sometime.
By the way,to be successful,GM will have to buy one of the three top placed teams,then rebrand.Because anything outside of the top five places would be a failure.That’s just how f1 is.
And even if you succeed, f1 very rarely helps the car brand! When it does it’s ONLY because they decide to make compelling road cars while they’re at it.
You know what else sells?Making compelling cars!Forget about eff-none,make desirable cars and come out ahead.
Not throwing away hundreds of millions is the better bet.Surely even GM would balk at wasting that amount?
For many years I’ve felt F1 is just how non-technical car guys try to appear technical when most couldn’t even begin to describe how an engine functions.
As a European:
The only reason I know the name Andretti is due all the news about them wanting to join F1 this past year. Otherwise I would have no idea they existed.
GM, same, I wouldn’t even know which brands fall under it. And after looking at wikipedia I recognize Chevrolet, Cadillac, Opel and Daewoo. But none of them are sold any more in Europa (either by choice, selling the brand or not existing anymore). Then again how many Americans would know VAG or PSA?
But indeed, if somebody who has a capability of competing on a decent level wants to join, let them.
He raced in F1 for Lotus (John Player and Martini), Scuderia Ferrari, Parnelli Jones, and Marlboro Alfa Romeo. He was a huge name in racing.
It’s that Andretti?
I was in the same room as him once, years ago. I hadn’t made the link.
Same guy
Blimey. Well if he can’t get an F1 team bid taken seriously F1 must be run by exactly to sort of idiots it’s always seemed to be run by.
Saying you don’t know Andretti (while pretending to be an F1 fan) is like saying you’ve never heard of Sterling Moss or Jody Scheckter. Mario is like one of the most winningest driver across so many different racing types it’s crazy. He won Championship titles in CART and F1. He’s got race wins in those, plus Nascar, hill climbing, Champ Car, IndyCar, and 24 hour of LeMans. He’s a fuckin’ legend. From the mid ’60s to the early/mid ’90s he was driving the wheels off of everything, and winning a lot while doing it.
I think most F1 fans who are old enough will know of Andretti the F1 driver from decades ago, but in Europe at least, there isn’t much coverage about Andretti the current race team.
It’s like it’s a different continent over here.
Both Andrettis were F1 drivers. In ’93 Michael Andretti drove for McLaren alongside Senna. It was a pretty pisspoor showing, though, I don’t place as much blame on him as most other’s due. McLaren was going through a rough patch. Had Michael Andretti stayed for a second season, I think he would have done much better.
Michael also had a pretty darn successful racing career as a driver in CART and other series as well. Not as successful as his father, but he drove all over the world and did quite respectably (F1 excluded).
Again, if you are an F1 fan, you should really know the Andretti name.
I know the name, but it’s from decades ago. I don’t know anything about Michael, or CART.
Vauxhall is GM’s UK brand, Opel for Europe, and Holden for the Aussies. You’ve almost certainly been in a GM car, even if you’ve never owned one.
But how would I know that Opel was a GM brand? I don’t think you saw the GM name anywhere at a dealer.
Ha. This is the ill informed snobbery Matt’s talking about. American’s know who VW is, if not because of the Beetle, because of the blatant fraud used to sell vehicles. PSA doesn’t even exist anymore, because they needed to merge with American brands to be successful. How do you as a reader of the Autopian, presumably an automotive fan, not know who/what GM is? Europeans like to rip on Americans a lot, while seemingly choosing to forget/ignore the past and what America (GM, Ford, Chrysler) did for Europe from 1942-1945.
I’m not saying Volkswagen, I’m saying VAG. Of course I know the brands Cadillac and Chevrolet, I just did not know who’s the parent company. That’s what I said. We don’t have any GM cars here, so is it really strange that I don’t know which sub-brands fall under it?
I think pretty much every American who’s ever been in the car market knows VW, Audi, and Porsche are the same parent company, since those dealers are quite often clumped together in the same building or side by side. Bentley and Lambo might be less common knowledge, but anyone in the market for them would know it.
And VAG housing Audi and Porsche is predated by Cadillac and Chevrolet being part of GM.
“while seemingly choosing to forget/ignore the past and what America (GM, Ford, Chrysler) did for Europe from 1942-1945.”
Of course for Europeans that war started in 1939.
Of course. I just find it rich that a euro snob is trashing the name recognition of industry leaders who helped save the continent they live in.
Their comments actually shed light on F1 and European business in general being nothing more than a continuation of propaganda filled dictatorial regimes they’ve all had at one point. They’re just pacified with free healthcare, long vacations, and free american protection. I wonder if they know the planes in their skies warding off Russia are all American…
And I’m far from a Stan for the USA, but come on.
Eurofighter have kept very quiet about how the typhoon is really American.
The balkan states use and continue to buy american planes and they’re the first line between Russia and the EU. No one’s going to get in a dog fight over London. Reconnaissance, drones, and stealth operations are the new war of which Americam products dominate the space.
I’m not American. I’d have to Google Andretti to know more than it’s a race team, and GM are the people who used to own SAAB before they killed it and used to own dreary Vauxhall before they sold it to the French.
F1 is the soundtrack to my post-lunch naps on a Sunday afternoon so I’m interested in it, but not a huge fan. I feel a solid meh about the Andretti news, partly because I don’t know who they are and partly because I assume all the F1 decisions are badly made because of greedy and stupidity.
The Hamilton news just seems weird. Why swap to the team that makes all the bad calls? Does he enjoy complaining about strategy that much?
But what does it matter if you know who Andretti and GM are? More cars = better, especially if the point is to continued development in the cars we love; ICE vehicles. It’s not about this at all, this is the distraction, it’s about the FIA extracting as much as they can from an outsider.
The story said one of the reasons for the deal not going through was poor global brand recognition, and that it was insulting. I was offering anecdotal evidence that the brand recognition is poor outside of the US.
I like new teams coming in and shaking things up. It gives us something to watch while the current guy-who-wins-everything is winning everything. Unless the new team is Brawn, but that’s unlikely to happen twice.
Maybe I’m getting old, but more and more I can’t stand the sausage when I learn how it is made. FIA is as corrupt and disgusting as FIFA, and also like football, the money involved all around makes rooting for anyone kind of weird anyway – like competitive lawn irrigation in the middle of a drought.
Pure douchbaggery. Great job killing passion before it can blossom into worthy competition for the Euro-trash crowd.
“…F1 would bring value to the Andretti brand rather than the other way around.”
Even assuming for the moment that this would be true (a big assumption), it’s unfortunate, and all too telling, that this would be seen as a problematic relationship between a governing body and a team.
There are some pretty darn pithy comments this evening I must say. Wow. Have loved reading them. It’s a kind of validation that nobody in F1 will see them. Makes me want to obey Matt’s injunction to someday (!) go to Le Mans.
F1 is still a thing? Hadn’t noticed since I lost interest in billionaire conga lines.
Cartel gonna cartel
Fuck ’em in the ear.
Mario Andretti would have sure been proud
Of the way I’d be moving when I pass that crowd,
But, sadly folks we’ll just never know
‘Cause Formula 1 up and told us no
So it’s on to Indy and NASCAR speedways
Who wants to race with those poofs anyways
<appreciative golf clap>
Well done!
C’mon, the name Andretti is as Italian as pizza pie! Last I checked, Italy is in Europe. And Cadillac is named after an exceedingly French explorer. Also European. What’s the problem?
They don’t want to have to convert Euros to Dollars…
Solid thumbs down to F1 racing. I tried getting on board with the Vegas race this year and it wasn’t horrible, but any other race that I watched was the worst. When you have to point all the coverage to cars back in the pack because the race race for the lead was a forgone conclusion? Count me out! I really wanted to like it. The whole cutting edge technology thing was a draw, but uncompetitive racing is just boring.Let them keep their fixed racing in Europe. Good riddance
It’s as if the F1 folks took the masterclasses from FIFA, UEFA, NFL, and MLB on how to somehow simultaneously grow your audience (MLB excepted here) and $$$ while still pissing off massive swaths of them through decisions that just boil down to sheer greed from ownership.
Not at all unexpected from F1, but still really disappointing.
EDIT:
One thing from the official rejection that I’d love to understand more about was this part:
Anyone seen any reporting on why they didn’t do the in-person?
So, I have no info, but I was discussing this topic with a friend and we cooked up a theory. The F1 folks sent an email at midnight with the offer to meet at 7am the next morning, knowing full well Andretti wouldn’t be able to make it to Europe from North America in that timeframe, all so they could say they made the offer and it was Andretti’s fault it didn’t happen. Again, zero evidence to support the theory, but doesn’t it sound like something the F1 folks would do?
My guess is there had probably been strong hints that the application was going to be rejected.
Let’s all NOT renew the subscription to the F1 streaming app. That’s my plan, anyway.
Same. Which is unfortunate as my wife and I do really enjoy watching the races together. But you can’t slap me in the face and then ask for my wallet.
F1 sucks, and everyone who fawns over it endlessly are a bunch of cucks.
Too harsh? Maybe. But I’ve had a shit couple of days, and I’ve never understood why so many people spend fuck-tons of money to watch races where more often than not you know who is going to win before anyone even shows up. What is the fucking point of that bullshit?
People won’t like this take, and the endless F1 circle jerk at The Drive would probably have a few choice words for you, but I have to wholeheartedly agree. I’m a big NASCAR guy and have to put up with a lot of negativity around that, but somehow F1 gets a pass while being arguably the worst racing series out there right now. A toxic culture with predictable racing and uninspiring cars.
I am a huge IndyCar fan myself. I can take my family of four to the race at Road America for the entire weekend, for less than the price of a pair of F1 tickets. That includes tickets, hotel, food souvenirs, everything.
Yes yes, but you see NASCAR is just so… American. The people that like NASCAR are obviously hicks! And We don’t like them!
I follow more cycling than I do auto racing, but it’s crazy to look at the simple disdain for the American series. “F1 is obviously so sophisticated, you see! And Me? I’m sophisticated!” The only thing Europeans like more than their sports is the shadowy, obviously corrupt, all powerful bureaucracies that run them like criminal enterprises. But, you know, sophisticated.
Tickets to the Vegas GP averaged over $800. My fiancé and I are going to the upcoming Atlanta Cup race(say what you will about NASCAR, but the Atlanta races have had the best racing with the next gen car IMO) and spent less than $600 between race tickets, airfare, a hotel, and rental car. F1 does not give the slightest of fucks about American race fans and with so many other(and better) options for us to spend our money and time on, I always question why anyone here wastes their time on F1 anymore. If they still sounded as amazing as they did in the V10 days, sure, I could see the appeal, but the cars sound like dogshit and the sport actively hates the average American race fan.
I call shenanigans! And I ain’t even American…
You an Aussie or Canadian? Just guessing off the username…
IMSA is and will remain my racing heart. The accessibility, the atmosphere, the cars, the cost. I will be honest, I never ever follow a team or standings, but I love love love the races. Road Atlanta for the Petit Le Mans is a vital pilgrimage for me every year, the one vacation I always block off, buy tickets, non-negotiable.
I read about F1 blacking out fucking hotel windows and I could give a shit if I ever see one of their shitfit poop-pantsing pageant of a race.
One of these days I’d love to get to an IMSA race. How are road courses as a spectator? Watkins Glen is on my NASCAR bucket list but I’ve always wondered if I’d enjoy a road course in person.
Your response is so polite I feel a little guilty! I am fed up with F1’s shenanigans though and that’s from someone who is “vaguely aware it exists.”
I like VIR, but it doesn’t always get the full run of IMSA series. Road Atlanta, despite being five hours further away, feels like my home track. I spend all day on PTLM day just sort of hiking from turn to turn, like 6 and 7 where you can technically see the cars with no fence between you or 10A and 10B where the you can see the rotors glow after dark. But that’s Road Atlanta specifically.
IMSA itself just feels joyful. The access is a big draw for me. There are opportunities to meet drivers, do a grid walk, walk the paddock. Tickets, even big ones for PTLM are something like $100. (I planned to go to Daytona for the first time this year but was laid off two weeks prior.) The mix of classes is exciting, and funny enough the GTD/GTD Pro classes are closer to stock car racing than NASCAR, which I like. The prototypes are wicked but I love seeing cars I recognize, too.
They make efforts to make it spottable, with differently colored LED-lit numbers on the cars to show realtime data of class and placement. They often have MX-5 Cup races running earlier in the day for shorter races.
Finally, Cadillac’s swag game has gotten better and better every year. “The Shape of Wins to Come” with all the IMSA tracks on it is *chef’s kiss*
https://www.imsa.com/weathertech/discover/the-classes/
My friends and I typically do at least a couple NASCAR races a year, and I’ve done a new track yearly for the past 6 or 7 years, but I’ll have to try and convince some of them to do an IMSA race with me. I’ve always enjoyed it but never got into it since I’ve never really had a rooting interest, but being a Penske fan(my driver in Cup is Ryan Blaney) I’d love to see those Penske-Porsches in person, as well as the Mustang GT3. Every year I’ll tune in to the Rolex 24 since by this time of year I’m just itching for the Cup season to start, but this past race was the first time in a while that I really paid attention to it and I really enjoyed it. At the end I was really torn between rooting for Penske or the Cadillacs(I make a living selling GM parts), but it was an exciting race either way.
Totally agree on F1. I have zero interest in a sport that is so hateful to American fans. As I said elsewhere, my fiance and I are doing Atlanta in a few weeks for under $600 between tickets, airfare, a hotel, and a rental car. The Vegas GP was over $800 for the cheapest race tickets. To hell with that.
I’m a Porsche fanboy and seeing those GTPs in person last year was jaw dropping. So was seeing the AO Racing Rexy.
I went to my first one last year at Road America and it was great. It was me, my wife, and two kids (7 and 9). The paddock access was awesome, chill atmosphere with lots to do, and we just kept moving from one spot to another to catch different parts of the race. Lots of screens and loudspeaker commentary to keep up with what was going on and tons of racing with the other series racing the same weekend. One of the unexpectedly best parts was just mingling with other race fans. We’re going back for sure.
IMSA and IndyCar are where it’s at. NASCAR, in my opinion, is also getting better. Yes, they are still predominantly oval, but they have added more road races than ever and even did a street race last year in Chicago.
F1 goes through long periods of time where you almost always know who will win. When it’s competitive it is fantastic, the problem is those periods are lacking.
Yeah fuck F1.
I’m here to see Lewis bag the 8th, then I’m gone.
So you’ll be around quite a while, then.
Yeah, it definitely depends on whether the championship is decided by the drivers performance or the race director.
I liked F1 as a kid, during the peak Schumacher domination era but eventually lost interest in it. Seeing F1 blow up in popularity here over the past few years got me wondering if I was missing out on something because I like racing but modern F1 just doesn’t do it for me for some reason. I was about willing to give it another shot this year until the Andretti news came out.
It’s very clear that F1 wants American money but doesn’t want a competitive American team that could potentially crash their party of the special elite chosen ones (aka European based teams). Well F1 isn’t going to get any of my money, mostly because I’m broke and they are increasingly open about how they don’t want the common folk like me anyway.
My experience is similar. Liked F1 when I was younger, especially the Schumacher years where even though he was always winning, it seemed like anyone on the grid could win if he had a bad day. But then even back then F1 was both courting a US audience while telling Americans they were too redneck to appreciate the beauty of F1, and that soured me on being any kind of substantial fan. I will admit that I do pay cursory attention to it, mostly to get a chuckle at how much it plays favorites and blocks those teams and drivers it hasn’t anointed as victors, but even that I’ve struggled with the last few years. Five years ago Hamilton going to Ferrari would have caused me to at least audibly gasp. Today, the news barely elicited a shrug.
Not gonna happen, but this was my pipe dream today. Per Ben S’s comments today he implied that per the FIA they are allowed to race but per f1 are not allowed to enter the prize pool. It would be so awesome if they built a competitive car, raced it, and continuously finish top 10, stealing points away from the “competitive” manufacturers.
Don’t hold back, Matt!
This must be what it feels like when people that use terms like “sportsball” read sports articles.