There's more than a little bit of snobbery involved, too. They better be careful as they could easily lose the US audience that they've recently gained. Too many more seasons of Red Bull domination & people are going to start turning it off.
It's a bit more than greed as far as I can tell. They didn't include the other teams' concerns in their decision by all accounts & that's where the most greed lay as they felt that the prize fund would be too far diluted between all teams. There is some logic to F1's decision. Andretti doesn't have an engine yet & expects to be getting one from Renault until GM come online. The worry is that GM will have indirect access to Renault IP. Also, they reckon they'll be ready to race in 2025. However, come 2026, the regulations on car design will get a massive overhaul, so Andretti will need to build an entirely new car in only their second season which, if their first season was a train wreck, would probably be financially prohibitive. If I were them, I'd have applied for 2026 entry & start development on the car now, but then there's still the question of engine supply. I'm sure there are many palms being greased with the F1 organisation, but what I read did seem to make at least some sense. As for their competitiveness argument, I personally I can't see how the likes of Haas, Alfa Romeo, Alphatauri & Williams haven't all folded & don't think they're terribly competitive. I think all teams should have to fight it out for a place on the grid each season just like a football team needs to qualify for the knockout stage of any tournament. Lastly, & this is something that I see no mention of anywhere. A lot of races end up being just a long series of formation laps with circuits getting narrower & so passing opportunities fewer & fewer. Putting two more cars on the grid is basically adding to the traffic jam. If Andretti do get accepted, F1 are going to need to prune the field or it'll be a mess. Ultimately, if the decision was purely $ driven, the F1 could have easily accepted, taken the $200million buy in to cover the prize fund dilution (which teams have already claimed isn't enough) & potentially just let a rookie F1 team go to the wall in under 2 seasons.
It's a bit more than greed as far as I can tell. They didn't include the other teams' concerns in their decision by all accounts & that's where the most greed lay as they felt that the prize fund would be too far diluted between all teams. There is some logic to F1's decision. Andretti doesn't have an engine yet & expects to be getting one from Renault until GM come online. The worry is that GM will have indirect access to Renault IP. Also, they reckon they'll be ready to race in 2025. However, come 2026, the regulations on car design will get a massive overhaul, so Andretti will need to build an entirely new car in only their second season which, if their first season was a train wreck, would probably be financially prohibitive. If I were them, I'd have applied for 2026 entry & start development on the car now, but then there's still the question of engine supply. I'm sure there are many palms being greased with the F1 organisation, but what I read did seem to make at least some sense. As for their competitiveness argument, I personally I can't see how the likes of Haas, Alfa Romeo, Alphatauri & Williams haven't all folded & don't think they're terribly competitive. I think all teams should have to fight it out for a place on the grid each season just like a football team needs to qualify for the knockout stage of any tournament. Lastly, & this is something that I see no mention of anywhere. A lot of races end up being just a long series of formation laps with circuits getting narrower & so passing opportunities fewer & fewer. Putting two more cars on the grid is basically adding to the traffic jam. If Andretti do get accepted, F1 are going to need to prune the field or it'll be a mess. Ultimately, if the decision was purely $ driven, the F1 could have easily accepted, taken the $200million buy in to cover the prize fund dilution (which teams have already claimed isn't enough) & potentially just let a rookie F1 team go to the wall in under 2 seasons.
Obviously this is a complicated issue. I think everyone has some valid points here. Should be interesting to see how it all plays out.
I thought of you all this morning. We asked the progeny about their spring semester elective choices at school. The Glaswegian drama teacher is running a Formula 1 elective. Kid isn’t excited about any of the offerings, so they randomly ranked their choices. We’ll see if that one’s the winner.
Spawn did end up getting placed in the Formula 1 elective in school. They actually said, "it's not so bad" (in jaded, city tween speak that means "I like it"). They said the teacher told them Kimi Raikkonen is the master of the throttle. Glad they're learning something.
The Alpine episode showed what a couple of idiots they have racing for them. & there was too much Monaco footage. That race should be scrubbed from the calendar i think. It's not a race at all. It's a tourist board advert & nothing more