Andretti intend to enter F1 well before Cadillac’s 2028 engine plans are realised

RaceFans Round-up

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In the round-up: Cadillac’s announcement it will enter Formula 1 as an engine manufacturer in 2028 won’t lead Andretti to delay its arrival.

In brief

Andretti still wants to enter F1 as soon as possible

The earliest Michael Andretti’s planned team can make it onto the grid is 2025, one year before a major change in F1’s technical regulations. Andretti previously announced it would enter in conjunction with General Motors brand Cadillac, but has not yet agreed commercial terms for joining the world championship with its owner Liberty Media.

Cadillac announced yesterday it plans to enter as an engine manufacturer in 2028. Despite that, Andretti remains committed to entering sooner.

“This [announcement] does not mean that Andretti is deferring its planned entry,” an Andretti spokesperson told RaceFans. “Andretti Cadillac will still enter F1 as soon as possible. The team would then compete under GM power starting in 2028.”

Williams adds Lia Block to their academy

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Williams have made a surprise signing with the latest addition to their academy: 17-year-old off-road racer Lia Block.

The American was a class champion in the USA’s national rally championship this year and has also raced in Extreme E and the Nitrocross rallycross series. Her Nitrocross season continues into 2024, when she will also move into single-seater racing by driving in the Formula 4-spec, all-female F1 Academy series for the ART Grand Prix team, alongside new McLaren junior Bianca Bustamante.

“I’m so excited to be joining the Williams Driver Academy and competing in F1 Academy in 2024,” said Block. “This is something I never could have dreamed of. I can’t wait to embrace this new experience and learn as much as possible.”

Her father Ken, who died earlier this year, was a winner in major rallycross championships and competed in the World Rally Championship. He was best known for his Gymkhana stunt driving video series.

Ecclestone wanted F1 to race down Las Vegas’s Strip in the 1980s

Bernie Ecclestone, who headed F1 before Liberty Media took over the championship, says he tried to take the series to the Las Vegas Strip when it held a pair of races in the city in the early eighties.

The race, run in 1981 and ’82, marked F1’s first visit to the city of Las Vegas which it returns to this weekend for the inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix. While drivers will be racing down the city’s famous strip on Saturday, the car park of the Caesars Palace hotel was used for the first two races.

“The only problem last time was we couldn’t run on the Strip, which is what I wanted to do,” Ecclestone told Reuters. “I wanted to make sure when somebody turned their television on they knew they were in Vegas, not in the desert. They promised me ‘yes, we can do it’.

“The first year we ran in this area which was Caesars Palace car park, or part of it, but it was on the understanding that the following year we’d be able to do what I had in mind. But it never happened because the people in Vegas, all the hotels, couldn’t see that it was going to be any good for them.”

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Yesterday through my eyes🥹 #LewisHamilton 2008 @McLaren #F1 World Championship car at #VelocityInvitational #PatoOWard

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Comment of the day

Artificial intelligence has been one of the biggest growing technologies of 2023, and is being used in more industries and in an increasing variety of ways. Could it feature more heavily in motorsport games, where the technology commonly referred to as ‘AI’ is usually much more basic?

Calling the parametrically defined opponents of AAA racing games AI is a bit of an insult to autopilot. Sophy is a step in the right direction but as shown it needs to be weakened to be able to be able to be able to be challenged by anyone but the best in the world.

I wonder if thanks to AI augmentation motor racing will eventually turn into more of a strategic battle of which lines to take and how to use the available resources (fuel, tyres, etc…) rather than a test of reflexes and feel for the car. For sure no one will want to watch it, but it’ll be interesting to see what happens to racing at the club level when this kind of tech becomes widely available.
Tristan

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Loki, Tom Watson, Deej92 and Forzarogo!

On this day in motorsport

  • On this day in 1932 Jerry Unser was born. The member of the Unser racing dynasty made his sole world championship race start in 1958

Author information

Ida Wood
Often found in junior single-seater paddocks around Europe doing journalism and television commentary, or dabbling in teaching photography back in the UK. Currently based...

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7 comments on “Andretti intend to enter F1 well before Cadillac’s 2028 engine plans are realised”

  1. S
    15th November 2023, 1:06

    Andretti… joining the world championship with its owner Liberty Media.

    Incorrect – FIA is the owner of F1, and they’ve already approved Andretti’s entry.
    Liberty are the Commercial Rights Holder, and haven’t announced anything yet about the commercial aspects of Andretti’s entry (whether or not Andretti would be eligible for any prize money, commercial payments and official media access).

    I expect this announcement from GM guarantees Andretti’s approval from the commercial side of F1 even more than was already the case – the only variable being which year…

  2. Profile Photo

    Rhys Lloyd (@justrhysism)
    15th November 2023, 2:02

    Really enjoyed reading that piece about Schmitz. Highlighting such characters is really important for the future of STEM as a whole; people our daughters can look up to and want to be like and strive for.

    1. Profile Photo

      Shimks (@shimks)
      15th November 2023, 3:07

      Yes, great article, and agree fully with your comments. So good to see the needed changes speeding up.

  3. Profile Photo

    SteveR (@stever)
    15th November 2023, 4:02

    …F1 is going to bring an all-star crowd and clientele that should theoretically make up for any inconvenience experienced by businesses…

    I guess I’m old, but the constant ‘celebrity’ shots on the pre-grid et al leave me cold, as I don’t know who they are and don’t care. What I care about is F1 racing, so showing some unknown face to me means exactly nothing. We’re not all that shallow, FOM, that we need to be fed this pap.

    1. notagrumpyfan
      15th November 2023, 7:15

      I don’t know who they are and don’t care.

      And often it’s not even helpful how they describe/introduce them.
      I understand that a celebrity can be an influencer, but not how an influencer can be a celebrity.

    2. pastaman
      15th November 2023, 16:12

      I don’t mind pre-grid cameos, it’s during the race all the cutaways to celebs and/or the crowd that is the most frustrating

  4. Profile Photo

    KaIIe (@kaiie)
    15th November 2023, 6:24

    Re: COTD. While I agree that the computer controlled opponents in video games are rather different to the current surge of AI services, they have been called AI for decades (probably ever since Super Mario Kart or Indy 500 came out).

Comments are closed.