In the round-up: Porsche says it is still interested in Formula 1 after its efforts to enter the series in 2026 fell through.
In brief
Porsche still interested in F1
Porsche unsuccessfully pursued a tie-up with Red Bull for the 2026 season and subsequently announced it will not enter F1 when new engine regulations arrive in two years’ time. However the company’s director of motorsport sales Michael Dreiser says the brand, which also competes in WEC and Formula E, remains interested in F1.
“Motorsport will always be at the core of our brand identity,” he told Blackbook Motorsport. “Formula 1 remains an interesting racing series for us.
“For the next few years, we are concentrating on the current factory programmes with the Porsche 963 in WEC and the IMSA series, as well as in Formula E with the Porsche 99X Electric. There, we want to fight for overall victories. That is our tradition and our main focus, and we do not comment on speculation beyond that.”
BMW confirms crew for two WEC teams
BMW has finalised its driver line-up for the two WRT-run M Hybrid V8s which will contest the World Endurance Championship this year.Car number 15 will be driven by Dries Vanthoor, Raffaele Marciello and Marco Wittmann. Their team mates in the number 16 car are Sheldon van der Linde, Robin Frijns and Rene Rast.
Williams and Haas reveal new junior drivers
Two Formula 1 teams have announced new junior drivers for the coming season. Haas has signed Chloe Chambers, who will fulfil their obligation to back one driver in F1 Academy. She finished ninth in Formula Regional Oceania last year, winning one race.
Williams has signed Alessandro Giusti, who won the French Formula 4 championship in 2022 before moving into Formula Regional Europe. Giusti will return to FREC this year with ART.
The second new signing to Williams’ young driver programme is 13-year-old Japanese kart racer Sara Matsui. She will continue in karts this year, competing in the OKJ class and the 2024 Champions of the Future Academy supported by F1 Academy.
Two more F3 drivers confirmed
Formula 3 teams MP and Jenzer confirmed two more drivers who will contest the 2024 season yesterday. Tim Tramnitz will graduate from FREC to race for MP. Max Esterson, who started four races for Carlin last year, has signed up for a full season with Jenzer.
GT Manager ’24 coming to PC
The team behind the popular GT Manager mobile game is producing an expanded version for PC, which will arrive on Steam later this year. GT Manager ’24 will include cars licensed from WEC, IMSA and the GT World Challenge Europe series.
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Links
Motor racing links of interest:
Whisper to produce Channel 4's Formula 1 coverage until 2026 (Whisper Films)
'Whisper will continue to deliver two highlight shows during each race weekend, with five live shows across the British Grand Prix weekend in July. All shows will continue to be produced remotely from the UK.'
Madrid to be added to F1 calendar (The San Diego Union-Tribune)
'The official announcement will be made next week in the Spanish capital, according to the sources familiar with the deal, which will bring the series back to the Madrid region more than 40 years after it last hosted an F1 race.'
Diuguid: No Added Pressure to Perform by Customer 963s (Sportscar365)
'Reliability problems, if something breaks on one car, immediately all of the other cars need to know. But at one point it’s coming to performance. Then there’s not such a direct link between all those teams.'
'Einen Euro fuer F1-Deal bezahlt' (Auto Motor und Sport - German)
'If I remember correctly, there was a clause in Kamui Kobayashi's contract that he could only be replaced by a pay driver. Maybe I paid a euro for the deal and then I was in the cockpit.'
Will.i.am On Mercedes Sound Drive, Hamilton and insane car collection (Sports Illustrated)
'Through Nicole (Scherzinger), I became friends with Lewis. And when I met him, I'm like, 'Wait, there's black F1 racers?' And they're like, 'Yo, this guy is an amazing driver. He's going to win it. He's going to change the game.''
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Social media
Notable posts from X (formerly Twitter), TikTok and more:
Ayao Komatsu takes over @HaasF1Team principal role after starting F1 as a tyre engineer in '03.
That's out the back of the garage, lobbing tyres around, temp/pressure management, and tyre to the car at the right time etc.
Ok, it's 20 years later, but that's a journey. He'll…
— Alex Brundle (@AlexBrundle) January 17, 2024
Add all the #F1 grand prix, qualifying and practice session times for the 2024 season announced so far to your calendar here:https://t.co/Y2y6ZLDzEu
— RaceFans (@racefansdotnet) January 17, 2024
Introducing JH.77-24 & JH.78-24 🚀 pic.twitter.com/NSIA9KVmqa
— Juncos Hollinger Racing (@juncoshollinger) January 17, 2024
My 2024 head protector pic.twitter.com/VJw0yKFvby
— Pato O'Ward (@PatricioOWard) January 17, 2024
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- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Comment of the day
Is F1 sleepwalking into trouble with its ever-growing calendar?
F1 just makes, I think, an excellent public case study. If there was any interest in being a net good for society other than a distracting entertainment product. F1 could do great things for society leading by example.
Instead we get this, ignoring all warnings and red flags and pushing ahead with commercial interests at the forefront. If something bad happens there’ll be quotes of nobody being able to predict it, and investigations launched as to how, and blame appropriately avoided.
But hey, at least we have the distracting entertainment. And there unironically is great value in that.
Tristan
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Keeleyobsessed!
Roger Ayles (@roger-ayles)
18th January 2024, 0:49
I guess Madrid will be yet another street circuit that will feature all the same characteristics of other modern street circuits.
I don’t even dislike street circuits; I actually used to love the completely different challenge they used to throw up. They used to be narrow, bumpy & feature a lot of surface changes that made them a significantly extra challenge & it was that additional & at times unique challenge that made them so much of a spectacle to watch.
But now they just end up feeling more like normal circuits with walls next to them as they all have to feature a super long straight, They all have to be very wide, Very fast & just as smooth as permanent circuits as they all get resurfaced regularly. And as a result they just all tend to lack any real character & so all end up feeling very samey…. I think the one exception been the middle sector in Baku which feels a bit more like an old school street circuits due to it been narrow, bumpy with zero room for error.
Unicron (@unicron2002)
18th January 2024, 9:58
I’d say that Monaco, Baku and the first two thirds of Singapore are bona-fide street circuits. Then you get ‘urban circuits’ like Valencia, Sochi and Jeddah. I’d imagine that the Madrid circuit is going to lean in the direction of the latter group.
This is why I have always loved Indycar – proper street circuits and road courses with grass, dust and gravel traps lying beyond the track limits. Essentially circuits in the style of F1 in the 80s and 90s.
RandomMallard
18th January 2024, 1:19
RE COTD: I saw quite an interesting video discussing whether Indycar is sleepwalking into a black hole and eventually to its own demise, particularly with regards to their engine manufacturers, but I think you’re right about F1 possibly following a similar fate (though admittedly from a much higher starting point). And in that (hypothetical) situation, it would be easy to call F1 a victim of success, but I think that would skirting away from the true reason: F1 would be a victim over oversqueezing and mismanagement from those in charge. I have a lot of respect for what Liberty Media have achieved, particularly in increasing the online scope of the sport, as well as things like F1TV, however I no longer believe, and haven’t for a while, that they are acting in the best interests of the sport.
Tomcat173 (@tomcat173)
18th January 2024, 3:52
Agree that F1 is falling into the trap of squeezing the sport for everything that its worth. I would have thought bringing F1 to the American market would have done alot for them already.
They’ve kind of forgotten that something rare can hold great(er) value. When the sport had 18 races each event was important, and F1 wasn’t on every other weekend during the season. Missing a race meant not watching F1 for 4-6 weeks. Having so many races also changes the dynamic of the championship too, with phases of the season where a driver/team might have an upswing/downswing in form, rather than for single races in isolation.
Let’s hope the sport doesn’t get strangled to death.
SteveR (@stever)
18th January 2024, 16:44
Agreed. The shorter season with 16 races was, IMHO, ideal. Unfortunately Liberty is a for profit company and are squeezing the ‘sport’ for all its got as an extra race is extra income. F1 for me has lost its technical shine; I haven’t bought the AutoCourse annuals for years, as all the interesting technical stuff has vanished from it. The cars have become over-weight and over long and the over specific regulations have stifled engine and car development. Even the front/rear weight balance is specified…..
mooa42
19th January 2024, 2:03
16 races is my ideal number too, quite often the anticipation is better than the event itself and you really get invested in race when it does happen.
Brell-9W
18th January 2024, 3:57
It’s nice to see Tim Tramnitz get a decent seat in Formula 3. Hopefully he can do well in the series, although being a new Red Bull junior has a lot of pressure.
GeeMac (@geemac)
18th January 2024, 4:04
No Porsche, no. Enough now. Stop pretending you care about F1. You had input into the 2026 rules, you had a deal lined up with the best team of the moment and you still decided not to enter. It is 100% clear that Porsche will never enter F1 again.
Elvira
18th January 2024, 5:00
I got the impression that Porsche were effectively put off by Horner.
Even given frustrating interruptus, at any stage of the game I’d be happier with a Porsche entry than say one backed by General Motors.
MichaelN
18th January 2024, 10:17
F1 is still ridiculously expensive. Having both Audi and Porsche involved at the same time is probably a big ask even for a group the size of Volkswagen/Porsche.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
18th January 2024, 10:57
The problem lies with F1, as they have yet to call their bluff. Porsche’s interest in F1 is primarily centered around participating in technical discussions to gain insights into engine rules and the associated technology, without a commitment to any further involvement.
Jungle
19th January 2024, 12:50
They need to stop dipping their toe in the water and just dive in. Lick the stamp and send as Ricciardo would say!
Canderous (@yoshif8tures)
18th January 2024, 5:31
Very nice interview with Lotterer. It really shows that in the end, even if you have all the talent in the world but aren’t in the right place at the right time with the right contacts you’ll just slip through the cracks and be lost to history.
He could have been a red bull driver but instead chose jaguar, and we all know how that ended up.
Then he paid one euro to race in Kobayashi‘s seat but decided that was enough since it was an awful car.
I still feel bad for Kamui as I rated him much higher than Perez. It was always exciting seeing him going wheel to wheel with Lewis etc and being at Suzuka to see him make the podium was an unforgettable experience.
So when it’s said that formula 1 is the pinnacle of motorsports with the 20 best drivers in the world, I have to disagree. At least half of the grid aren’t there on merit, it’s a combination of money and having the right sponsor more than talent or skill.
Brell-9W
18th January 2024, 12:52
As I’ve been saying a lot, I think it’s time for Formula 1 to come up with a new strategy regarding driver contracts. With the lack of testing, teams seem very reluctant to take on new drivers. Also, with increased safety, we’re seeing drivers extend their career to twenty years. That has caused a backlog of drivers who can’t enter Formula 1, some are very talented; Liam Lawson is the perfect example, if it wasn’t for Ricciardo’s hand injury we’d never have seen Lawson, yet he was able to immediately match Tsunoda.
I’d like to see the bottom teams in the constructors championship take on a pool of drivers, maybe 4. They go through some sort of an ‘elimination round’ and the best two make it to the Grand Prix. The elimination round might be a qualifying session or a time trial. Now I’m aware that teams only have two cars. So perhaps, driver A and B compete (against each other) in the first session, then there’s a gap, and drivers C and D compete in the second session. Let’s suppose A was faster than B, and D was faster than C, then A and D would continue to the rest of the weekend.
These sessions don’t add to the cost, as teams are already on track on Friday. It bring ten new drivers into the sport, is completely meritorious because it doesn’t artificially mandate someone into a seat, instead offers an opportunity for the best drivers to shine through. Perhaps to make it more meritorious, if a driver is continuously out performed, they are dropped. For example, if driver D out qualifies driver C in the Friday elimination ten times in a row, C can no longer compete in that season.
The other point I wanted to say about it is that I mentioned a time trial simply because sometimes I feel one great lap is not a true reflection of pace or skill. I know some people don’t like the idea. Also, it should only be for the bottom teams because the top teams are competing for a championship. We don’t want a scenario where a title contender isn’t starting a race because they were beaten in Friday elimination qualifying.
Anyway, that’s my idea to enhance the current state of Formula One.
Jere (@jerejj)
18th January 2024, 5:51
COTD brings a valid & unignorable point that hopefully won’t backfire in the long-term.
Emmanuel Katto (@emmanuelkatto)
18th January 2024, 6:18
I love Porsche too much