Michael Andretti will relinquish his ownership role at motorsports team Andretti Global, the team that has partnered with Cadillac to put the luxury marque on the Formula One grid.
According to a report from Sportico, Andretti, who is a five-time Indy 500 champ, will soon step down from his ownership role at the team. Andretti, who is the son of racing legend Mario Andretti, will stay with Andretti Global, but will take a step back to work behind the scenes in a less visible role.
“Michael’s goal has been to transition to a more strategic role with Andretti Global and focus less on the operational side of the race team,” Andretti Global told Sportico in a statement. “He and Dan Towriss have been working on a structure of what this could look like and have reached a direction that Michael is very happy with and believes will bring a positive future. Michael remains engaged and will continue to serve as a strategic advisor and key ambassador. We will have more to share in the coming weeks after Michael and Dan have had an opportunity to speak to the team.”
Whether Andretti’s decision to step down will throw another wrench in the Cadillac F1 bid remains to be seen, but the path has been anything but smooth for the luxury marque in its quest to break onto the grid. While the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) approved its application, F1 itself rejected it, prompting the U.S. Congress to launch an investigation into the refusal.
FIA President, Mohammed Ben Sulayem, even suggested that Cadillac purchase an existing team instead of trying to bring Andretti Global to the table. Purchasing one of the existing 10 teams would be quite a bit easier than pushing to bring an 11th team to the grid and diluting revenue shares, which has rubbed existing organizations the wrong way since the beginning.
