Christian Horner has run Red Bull since 2005 (Photo: Getty)
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has admitted that the opposition to the Andretti Cadillac Formula 1 team is all about money.
At the start of 2022, Michael Andretti, former F1 driver and son of 1978 world champion Mario, announced that he wanted to enter the sport with an all-new US-based team.
Despite a lukewarm reception to this news, the American has ploughed ahead with his plans, forging an partnership with General Motors through their Cadillac brand and putting the pieces in place for the team to make its debut in the next few years.
However, F1 is split over whether to bring an 11th team onto the grid, with governing body the FIA in favour, while the sport’s owners Liberty Media are not.
The current teams are also divided over the matter, with eight of the reportedly against the idea – McLaren and Alpine are said to be the two supporting Andretti who himself has accused his detractors of ‘greed and not looking at what is best for the overall growth of the series’.
Horner has now lifted the lid on why there has been so much opposition to introducing a new team on the grid, confirming Andretti’s comments that money is the primary factor.
He told RACER: ‘Look, Andretti is a great brand, a great team. Mario, what he did in F1 – as an American as well – is fantastic.
Ex-F1 driver Michael Andretti owns several racing teams (Photo: Getty)
‘Obviously GM with Cadillac as well would be two phenomenal brands to have in the sport, and I don’t think there can be any dispute about that. As with all these things though, it ultimately boils down to, “Well, who’s going to pay for it?”
‘And you can assume that the teams, if they’re perceived to be the ones who are paying for it – or diluting their payments to accommodate it — of course it’s not going to sit that well.
‘The two teams that are supporting it either have a partnership in the US with them, or are going to supply them an engine. The other eight are saying, “Well hang on, why should we dilute our element of the prize fund?”
Andretti announced their partnership with Cadillac at the start of 2023 (Photo: Andretti)
‘If you introduce another one or two teams, you dilute the value of the current 10 franchises, which of course teams – particularly down towards the bottom end of the grid – have got a very inflated inherent value at the moment.
‘On the other side you’ve got the Liberty guys saying, “Well we’re not going to pay for it. We’re happy with 10 healthy, competitive franchises from an operational perspective — garages, logistics, motorhomes — it’s all more to accommodate”.
‘I hope a solution can be found. What would be cleaner would be if they were able to take on one of the existing teams or franchises, but they are certainly both great brands that would be very, very welcome in Formula 1.’
At the end of each season, the F1 teams receive a share of the prize money which as Horner rightly points out would be diluted if more teams joined the grid.
As a result, the rules dictate that any new entrant has to pay a $200million fee to be split between the existing teams to off-set any prize money loss.
While Andretti seems to have no problem with this, there are reports that current teams want to double that fee given the increasing value of the sport and increasing cost of running it.
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There’s a lot of opposition to the American team.
