{"id":155775,"date":"2021-11-06T05:01:19","date_gmt":"2021-11-06T06:01:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=155775"},"modified":"2021-11-06T12:02:05","modified_gmt":"2021-11-06T12:02:05","slug":"why-indycar-heavyweight-walked-away-from-f1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=155775","title":{"rendered":"Why IndyCar heavyweight walked away from F1"},"content":{"rendered":"

IndyCar<\/a> team owner Michael Andretti said Thursday that \u201ccontrol issues at the 11th hour" derailed his bid to buy the Alfa Romeo team from Sauber but he has not given up on his attempt to acquire a Formula One<\/a> team.<\/p>\n

Andretti made his first public comments on the failed attempt, which had been a widely discussed topic surrounding F1's stop in Texas two weeks ago.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d just like to put an end to some of these rumors that the deal fell through because of financial reasons. That couldn\u2019t be further from the truth. That had nothing to do with that,\u201d Andretti said. "It basically came down to control issues in the final hours of the negotiations. That\u2019s what killed the deal. I\u2019ve always said if the deal is not right, we\u2019re not going to do it, and in the end it wasn\u2019t right. So we continue to look for other opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

He did not expand on the control issues, other than to say it meant \u201ccontrolling the team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andretti has been looking to expand his organization into F1 and was in negotiations with Sauber, which controls the Alfa Romeo team. He had also looked into getting IndyCar driver Colton Herta into a seat in Texas for the first practice session, when reserve F1 drivers can get on the track.<\/p>\n

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He confirmed Thursday that the 21-year-old Californian would have been part of any F1 venture by Andretti Autosport.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we do ever get a team, he would lead the way for us in terms of wanting to bring an American driver. He\u2019d be the perfect guy to do it,\u201d Andretti said. \u201cWe definitely were going to try to get him into the seat because I believe he could be a competitive driver in Europe. I really do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Ricciardo<\/p>\n

Herta spent two years racing in Europe before his opportunities stalled and he returned to the United States ahead of the 2017 season. He won six races in Indy Lights over two seasons before his 2019 promotion to IndyCar.<\/p>\n

Herta won a career-high three races this year and is headed into his fourth season of IndyCar. Had the F1 deal gone through, Andretti said he would have promoted Indy Lights champion Kyle Kirkwood to Herta's seat.<\/p>\n

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Instead, the option on Kirkwood's contract has expired and he's expected to take the $1.3 million scholarship awarded to the Indy Lights winner to A.J. Foyt Racing.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately at the moment we don\u2019t have a spot for Kyle, but that\u2019s not to say we won\u2019t in the future,\u201d Andretti said. \u201cWe\u2019re definitely going to watch him, and I\u2019m hoping he gets a full-time ride to get experience, and we\u2019ll see how that goes. The goal is to get him back in our family one day again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andretti has replaced two of his four drivers since the IndyCar season ended in September. Romain Grosjean was hired to take over Ryan Hunter-Reay's seat, and Lights driver Devlin DeFrancesco will replace James Hinchcliffe.<\/p>\n

\"Hamilton<\/p>\n

DeFrancesco will drive the car that is fielded in conjunction with George Steinbrenner IV. The 21-year-old Canadian has spent two years in the Andretti development system and leapfrogged Kirkwood for an IndyCar seat.<\/p>\n

Andretti noted that DeFrancesco was quicker than Kirkwood at a recent test, and DeFrancesco said his style was better suited for an Indy car than an Indy Lights car. He was the Indy Pro 2000 rookie of the year in 2020 and this season had two podium finishes in Indy Lights.<\/p>\n

\u201cDevlin getting the seat was always in the plan before Kyle was even around,\u201d Andretti said. \u201cIt\u2019s not like we picked Devlin over Kyle. It was always going to be Devlin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andretti also said he'd like to find a role for the 34-year-old Hinchcliffe to remain with the organization. The Canadian has had two different driving stints with Andretti.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love James. He\u2019s just such a great personality,\u201d Andretti said. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping to somehow keep him within the team.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IndyCar team owner Michael Andretti said Thursday that \u201ccontrol issues at the 11th hour" derailed his bid to buy the Alfa Romeo team from Sauber […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155775"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=155775"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155777,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155775\/revisions\/155777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=155775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=155775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=155775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}