After a six-month review, Formula One announced Wednesday that it had rejected a bid by Andretti Global and General Motors to expand the grid for the 2025 season and said it believed the team would have been incapable of being competitive in the international racing series.
The decision outraged American fans of the series and left Michael Andretti and GM exploring potential legal avenues. F1 said it would be willing to revisit the issue if GM has an engine ready for the 2028 season, but was adamant and sharply critical in telling Andretti no for 2025 and 2026.
In reaching its decision, F1 said it did not believe Andretti would be a competitive team; that the Andretti name does not bring the value to the series that Michael Andretti believes it would; and that getting on the grid in the next two years would be a challenge Andretti has never faced before.
"The fact that the applicant proposes to do so gives us reason to question their understanding of the scope of the challenge involved," F1 said in a statement. "Formula 1, as the pinnacle of world motorsport, represents a unique technical challenge to constructors of a nature that the applicant has not faced in any other formula or discipline in which it has previously competed. On this basis, we do not believe that the applicant would be a competitive participant."
The Andrettis had realized in recent months that winning F1 approval was going to prove difficult but the dismissive announcement had an unmistakable sting. Mario Andretti is the 1978 F1 world champion, and son Michael ran 13 races in the 1993 season.
"I'm devastated," the elder Andretti wrote on social media. "I won't say anything else because I can't find any other words besides devastated."
General Motors under its Cadillac brand had signed on to partner with Andretti, but the bid received extreme pushback from most of the existing 10 teams, F1 leadership and Liberty Media Corp., the American company that owns the commercial rights to the series.
The process became more complicated when GM said in November it had registered with F1's governing body to become an engine supplier starting in 2028. That backed F1 into a corner because it would be very difficult to turn away one of the largest automakers in the world, particularly an American company at a time the series has gained traction in the United States.
The United States hosted three races last season, more than any other country, and multiple U.S.-based companies from American Express and Visa to Oracle, Meta and MoneyGram have signed on as team sponsors over the last three seasons.
Cadillac said it "strongly disagrees" with the F1's review of the application but gave no indication if it will pursue an antitrust lawsuit against Formula One Management or Liberty.
The Andrettis have championed their push to join F1 as creating a true American team that likely would feature California-raised IndyCar driver Colton Herta.
"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," F1 said in its decision.
F1 has only one American-owned team -- Haas F1, which does not field cars for any American drivers -- and Logan Sargeant of Williams Racing is the only American racing in the series.
Sargeant scored just one point in his rookie 2023 season and his renewal for a second season wasn't completed until December. Haas, meanwhile, has never landed on a podium and consistently ranks at the bottom of the grid. Haas also just fired team principal Guenther Steiner, one of the stars of the Netflix docudrama about F1 that sparked fresh American interest in the series.
FILE - Michael Andretti attends a news conference for the IndyCar Grand Prix of Long Beach auto race, Saturday, April 15, 2023 in Long Beach, Calif. Formula One has rejected Andretti Global's application to join the global racing series in 2025 or 2026 but said Wednesday it is willing to revisit the issue in 2028 when General Motors has an engine ready for competition. (AP Photo/Jenna Fryer, File)
FILE - Michael Andretti, left, and his father, Mario Andretti, pose for a photo following a news conference at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas, June 7, 2013. Formula One has rejected Andretti Global's application to join the global racing series in 2025 or 2026 but said Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2024, it is willing to revisit the issue in 2028 when General Motors has an engine ready for competition.(AP Photo/Tim Sharp, File)