Colton Herta never wanted to be the center of the motorsports world’s latest political firestorm. The 22-year-old American driver just wanted to pursue his Formula 1 dreams, having already spent two of his formative years in Europe, flaming out on the junior formula ladder. Six years later, having all but given up hope, his father and manager, Bryan Herta, had nearly half of the F1 grid trying to get his cell phone number.
What changed? Colton Herta, arguably, projects no better a talent now than he did more than three years ago. Speaking strictly about black-and-white results, Herta just registered the worst full-time season of his IndyCar career (10th-place in points) with more finishes outside the top-10 than in it. And at 22, he’s reaching the older end of when F1 drivers tend to make their debut. In two or three short years, he’s said previously, he’d be seen as too old to be considered for a first shot.
What changed, you ask? One team – McLaren, in this case – took the opportunity to see what Herta could do in proper F1 machinery, instead of attempting to translate his results from an ultra-competitive IndyCar field. McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown laughed at the idea he’d ever share Herta’s actual testing data from his July outing at Portimao with other F1 teams, but he’s since fielded enough calls from fellow team principals and expects enough mechanics to gossip to know word of Herta’s legitimately crisp F1 speed and handling would make its rounds.
It’s why, in recent weeks, when Herta’s only previous F1 hope had been Michael Andretti’s failed attempt to buy a controlling interest of Alfa Romeo F1, and then to create an expansion team, his father has fielded outreach from Alpine and Alpha Tauri. Outside Sebastien Bourdais’s ill-fitted jump to Red Bull’s B Team after his four consecutive Champ Car titles 15 years ago, no American open-wheel racing driver has leapt – or, frankly, been given the opportunity – into F1 since Juan Pablo Montoya more than 20 years ago.
Whoever has or hasn’t come before Herta, Red Bull’s Christian Horner, Helmut Marko and Franz Tost, among others, have been trying to clear a seat for Herta by shipping away one of just two drivers to score an F1 win for Alpha Tauri .
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Brown, who currently has Herta under an F1 contract and is the lone team principal to know just how good he is, is actively spouting the young driver’s praise, knowing full well doing so may strip the talent from McLaren’s driver pool.
And yet, a series that has gone from 0 US races to 3 in 11 years, including one owned by an American media company and which has seen a viral Netflix docuseries exponentially grow F1’s American fan base, is prepared to let a poorly-crafted licensing system keeps away its first legitimate American prospect in seven years.
After the FIA released a statement to Motorsport.com last weekend promising it wouldn’t be “pressured by any teams into decisions on matters such as Super License points” and that its new president Mohammed bin Sulayem would abide by the system’s “robust governance” , Marko, a senior advisor for Red Bull, told reporters Friday that Alpha Tauri had opted to shelve its pursuit of Herta, who currently stands eight points shy of the 40-point threshold needed to obtain a Super License.
“It’s a shame that people don’t realize what value an American driver, especially a guy like Colton Herta, would have for the booming American market, especially with three F1 races,” he said.
Part of that statement feeds into the narrative that the Hertas have pushed against in recent weeks – that Colton should receive clearance because he’s the best young American racing talent on the market and F1 should be bending over backwards to cater to its fast-growing American audience .
By no means does Herta want a free pass. Alpha Tauri’s requests in recent weeks for the FIA to take a hard look at its current Super License system have had nothing to do with strictly trying to fast-track an American driver into the fold for the sake of doing so – and everything to do with hoping to take advantage of a legitimately fast driver who brings something significant to market around.
Alpha Tauri hoped the ‘force majeure’ clause added in response to the pandemic might be able to be used to retroactively include Herta’s Indy Lights points that had previously been tossed because of the series’ small field. That request was doomed from the start but what it should’ve done for those in charge was shed enough light on the silliness that a driver with Herta’s resume is currently barred because of his resume.
At the moment, Herta has accumulated 32 of the requisite 40 Super License points necessary to be eligible for a seat in 2023. As eye-popping as Herta’s win (7) and pole (9) totals are to those who acutely understand IndyCar’s level of competition and depth of its field, those numbers mean nothing to the FIA. According to their system, thrown together nearly a decade ago in response to Toro Rosso (now Alpha Tauri) hiring a 17-year-old Max Verstappen with just 1 year of car racing experience, all that matters is Herta hasn’t strung together the proper season-long points finishes it deems necessary.
By that system, finishing 3rd in F3 is just as valuable and should be looked upon just as highly as 3rd in IndyCar. Beyond 3rd place, the FIA actually awards more points for every position back to 10th for an F3 driver than it does one in IndyCar.
And through that system, this year’s Indy Lights champ Linus Lundqvist, who finished 3rd in Indy Lights in 2021 and 1st in the Formula Regional Americas championship in 2020, could now be hired by an F1 team, with his 43 Super License points. Herta cannot.
“It’s great for me, but it just shows how the system needs improving,” Lundqvist told reporters at Laguna Seca. “There’s no way in this world where I’m more qualified to be an F1 driver than Colton Herta. That’s not how it’s supposed to be.”
Added Ericsson, who raced five years in F1: “I understand you have rules for a reason. But the way IndyCar is undervalued in the F1 world is pretty ridiculous. To value IndyCar between F2 and F3, those are like kids racing pretty much. That’s what I’m more upset about. If you’re in the top-10 in the IndyCar championship, for me, you’re 100% qualified to drive in F1.
“Winning races here? No question you can race in F1.”
Those in F1 have tended to fall back on “the rules” and push against the idea Herta should be given an exemption without bringing any sort of proactive approaches to the table. Alfa Romeo and Haas team bosses Frederic Vasseur and Guenther Steiner said recently they’d be willing to see the points system amended. At the same time, Steiner, who may be in the market to hire a driver in the coming weeks, said Herta’s not on his radar strictly because of his Super License status.
Brown believes that the FIA, under bin Sulayem’s reign, is taking stock of everything he inherited as the new governing body president, but whether the Super License system actually gets touched remains to be seen.
“Half the field (in IndyCar) is F1-capable,” Brown said a week ago. “If someone who’s won a lot of IndyCar races isn’t eligible for a Super License, then I think we need to review the Super License system.”
I see the other side: What are the rules if not for the following? And governing bodies exist to prevent organizations from making decisions driven by money that wouldn’t be good for the sport. At some point, though, common sense has to prevail. The unfortunate part is this: The first American open-wheel driver in 15 years to earn a second look, who a team actively wants to hire, may help bring about the proper change, but there’s no indication of this opportunity will be around for Herta in a year to take advantage of.
If nothing changes, Herta could still finish top-3 in points in IndyCar in 2023 and earn himself a Super License, but who’s to say he’s going to have anywhere he can use it?
Alpha Tauri’s moves this offseason may set them up for the near-future, as McLaren has done and as Alpine likely will have done soon. At a time when Verstappen is closing in on the most dominant season the sport’s ever seen, the irony is a licensing system created in response to his hiring to make it tougher for teams to make outside-the-box hires may keep America’s best young racing Talent from a dream he easily deserves.
“I don’t think it hurts to ask the question,” said Bryan Herta. “But I think it’s uncomfortable with people – team owners, other drivers – making comments specific to Colton. I don’t think he wants to go there as some kind of special case. I think he wants to take a chance at F1, and I believe he’s good enough to deserve that chance, but you also don’t want to go over there with an asterisk walking in.”
