Colton Herta started his race week testing McLaren’s 2021 Formula 1 car in Portugal. Monday, the Andretti Autosport driver underwent his first of two days of testing at Autodromo Internacional do Algarve, the 2.9-mile natural terrain road course located just outside the Portuguese port city of Portimao, which the circuit is colloquially known as.
In March, McLaren announced it had signed Herta to an F1 testing deal for the 22-year-old to run a series of private test days in the team’s most recent car via F1’s recently announced TPC (testing of a previous car) program. Because racing regulations changed so drastically this past offseason, F1 teams are allowed to test young drivers in last year’s car in their own private test days. Then McLaren, for example, will choose from that pool of testing candidates, who will use it as its official “young drivers” to run F1’s mandated two Free Practice 1 sessions for prospective drivers later this year.
Herta was on-hand as McLaren’s guest at the Miami Grand Prix in early-May, allowing him to sit-in on all the engineering meetings, shadow the team during its track walk and generally soak in what an F1 weekend might be like inside the ropes.
“We want to give (Colton) a chance to run a Formula 1 car and see what he’s actually able to do in such a car,” said McLaren F1 team principal Andreas Seidl Sunday following the Austrian Grand Prix. “As you know, we have to do two times this year a free practice session with a young driver, and once we’ve tested all our candidates we want to give a chance in the TPC car, we will make our mind up who will actually run these free practice sessions.”
After his team was spotted setting up shop at Portimao early Sunday, Seidl confirmed his team would undergo three days of testing, with Herta running Monday and Tuesday, followed by the team’s simulator driver Will Stevens on Wednesday.
“We’re not doing really any work on the car. It’s a known, solid, consistent car so we can focus with (Herta) on getting used to running a Formula 1 style, which is a very big move. We’ll try to get him up to speed and find the right balance of the trim and make sure he doesn’t take too many risks as well, and we’ll show him how our Formula 1 team works.”
Last Monday, McLaren Racing CEO Zak Bown had told IndyStar that the F1 team’s TPC testing of Herta, as well as Arrow McLaren SP’s Pato O’Ward, would “most likely” not take place until after the IndyCar season’s finale Sept. 11 at Laguna sec. Brown cited the “peak craziness” of both F1 and IndyCar’s upcoming schedules, including eight races for the latter over the next nine weekends, including a return to Toronto this week.
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Plan clearly changed. If O’Ward’s TPC testing session doesn’t come until at least mid-September, assuming McLaren will be even more protective of its IndyCar driver’s focus and preparation for the closing stretch of the IndyCar campaign, the earliest we might see one — or both — of the drivers run an FP1 session would be mid-October. Notably, the US Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas falls Oct. 23, followed immediately by the Mexico City Grand Prix Oct. 30
Brown and Seidl have continued to emphasize that they have no seats to fill for the 2023 F1 campaign, although it’s well-known that its contract with the team’s veteran driver Daniel Ricciardo ends with the 2023 season. Brown did say in May, days ahead of the 500 and at a press conference confirming O’Ward’s new deal with the team through 2025, that both McLaren and Ricciardo had “certain mechanisms” that would allow either side to terminate their current deal early, though those precise contract details are not known.
With eight races left this season, Herta sits 10th in the standings, well behind the position he’d need to finish to ensure he could qualify for a Super License on his IndyCar results alone for any potential F1 run in 2023. Via his 3rd ( 2020), 5th (2021) and 7th-place (2019) IndyCar points finishes, he’s accumulated 32 points, leaving him eight points shy of the required 40 to obtain a license that would allow him to run in F1. Should he move up in the standings and with his 4 points from 2019 dropping off, Herta would need to finish 3rd-or-better this year to move past the threshold. Finishing 4th (10 points) would leave him 2 points short of 40 at 38, though close enough that he could run a couple FP1 sessions to reach the mark.
Since Herta’s announced McLaren testing deal, Michael Andretti has still considered the opportunity for his IndyCar driver isn’t much more than a favor from a good friend in Brown to help Colton gain the necessary experience to jump up to F1 with Andretti Global, should the potential F1 team get clearance from the FIA and Liberty Media to join the fray at the start of 2024. Brown, though, has contended that Herta is in serious consideration for a future F1 ride. The driver’s current IndyCar deal is said to expire at the end of the 2023 season.
“The worst thing that will come out of this is I get to test an F1 car, which I’d be extremely happy with,” Herta said following his testing deal announcement in March. “If that’s the worst thing that comes of this, it’s going to be amazing. I’ve always wanted to at least driver an F1 car once.
“Formula 1 is the goal of mine at some point and something that I want to do. Whether it comes with McLaren or Andretti or someone completely different, we’ll have to wait and see what happens.”
