The American motorsport brand Andretti was in talks with the owners of Sauber – which operates the Alfa Romeo F1 team – about a possible takeover last autumn.
Andretti is already represented in IndyCar, Formula E, Supercars and Extreme E and wanted to expand its reach to Formula 1 by buying a majority stake in the Sauber Group.
Michael Andretti planned to use Andretti Autosport IndyCar driver Colton Herta on one of the F1 seats just to get the deal in 11th.
Less than two weeks after Andretti confirmed the deal had expired, Alfa Romeo announced that F2 driver Guanyu Zhou would complete his line-up for 2022 along with Valtteri Bottas.
While the Andretti deal would have had a huge impact on the Sauber company and its F1 plans for the future, team boss Vasseur made it clear that the talks would have no impact on the preparations for 2022, apart from the postponement of the schedule for some decisions .
“We didn’t stop on the technical side and it didn’t slow development, that’s for sure,” Vasseur told Autosport.
“In some discussions, about sponsors, drivers, etc. we had to be a bit present.
“But in the end it won’t change the situation. It had no effect other than postponing some decisions. “
When asked if he found this a distraction for the team, Vasseur replied: “No – it was a distraction for me!”
© autosport.com
Frederic Vasseur, Team Principal, Alfa Romeo Racing, and Günther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1
Frederic Vasseur, Team Principal, Alfa Romeo Racing, and Günther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1
Photo by: Charles Coates / Motorsport Images
Bottas and Zhou have joined Alfa Romeo as part of an entirely new line-up for 2022, replacing the outgoing Kimi Räikkönen and Antonio Giovinazzi.
The team wants to recover this year under the revised technical regulations after having slipped to ninth place in the constructors’ championship in 2021.
The arrival of Zhou – the first Chinese F1 driver – will give the team a financial boost thanks to his sponsors, while Bottas, with five years of experience from the masterful Mercedes squad, will join them.
Also Read: McLaren ‘Resolutely’ Against Increasing Cost Cap For Damage In Sprint Race Hulkenberg: ‘Pretty Damn Fast’ F1 Cars 2022 May Still Hard To TrackAlfa Romeo: Bottas Can Thrive In Formula 1 Outside Hamilton’s ‘Shadow’
Vasseur spoke of the need to “build the foundations of the house first” before going “step by step” to raise Alfa Romeo further.
“For next year it’s a new project that is developing below the cost cap,” said Vasseur.
“We have a new line-up. We’ll have a new engine from Ferrari. We try to put it all together.
“But everyone is doing the same thing. Everyone is trying to improve the line-up, everyone is trying to improve the engine, everyone is recruiting. And it’s probably the best part of your job, everyone is performance-oriented and convinced that we will do a better job tomorrow. It’s the main motivation.
“In the end you have someone P1 and someone P10. We will have good results and bad results.
“The most important thing is that we as a company and from the shareholders to the people in the factory are convinced that we are on the right track.
“That is important to me because we need the support of all stakeholders.”
Top 10 key moments in the Formula 1 title fight in 2021
Click to expand
NEXT
Did you miss our previous article...
https://formulaone.news/haas/insiders-guide-the-f1-flag-rules
