I don't assume that they have a blank check from VW. Mercedes has received some flak from the German press and unions about their F1 expenses. VW, not being a premium brand, would be in an even more sensitive position. They wouldn't have the same subsidies from Bernie and Co. that Ferrari/Fiat get.
Or at best an equal. Still a step down. In public perception F1 is the big leagues. Unless they duplicate their results in GT racing (nigh impossible) they will lose status.
Citing facts not in evidence. I still contend that VW isn't interested in opening the money tap. If they were they'd put their own name on the car.
Honestly, aside from Europe, this money in Enduro is wasted. No one in the US follows it. The US is still their biggest market. They have a great racing legacy and people respect that. I think they do the minimum to keep this legacy relevant but I don't see much effort anymore.
+1 I was going to say something similar, but I get yelled at as an F1 apologist.... +1 Beautifully stated, as always. Another +1 I guess they'll come back, take a few years to get it right, dominate for a few years and then pull out..... Sports car racing (read, Le Mans, nothing else matters), has been that way ever since I can remember. Porsche, Audi, Peugeot, Toyota, perm any one from four. Rinse, repeat. The minor leagues. Cheers, Ian
You forgot Honda! Their timing may quite possibly be the biggest corporate screw up of all time!.... They could be basking in Brawns success, but gave it all away...... Bummer for them.
I guess I have to be the one to say it . . . Porsche is not in Formula 1, because they are afraid of failure. They don't want to be second fiddle to anyone. I love their cars, and I love their involvement in other forms of racing. But they should be in open wheels in some way. I appreciate the money argument, but they simply cannot be in F-1 and run 4th or 5th. Red Bull, Ferrari, McL and at least one other team would beat them consistently for a few years. And Porsche does not want that.
+1 Except I'd go further; no one follows it in Europe either! Outside of Le Mans, nobody, anywhere on the planet, could name more than Porsche, Audi or even Ferrari (!) as victors. Again, it's the minor leagues IMO. Cheers, Ian
I don't really agree. F1 is an establishment-only club. There's nothing to gain for anyone that seeks to enter now. Red Bull is an outlier primarily because the owner of that company doesn't have to answer to stock holders or boards of directors. He sells soda to go racing, and he doshes out lavishly on talent and facilities. While it is true that money is no guarantee of success in F1, the lack of money is a guarantee for failure. No reasonable board of directors is going to accept the folly that is a vast expenditure to run in F1 for so little return. What would Porsche gain from entering F1, besides a giant vacuum that sucks away vast amounts of coin? They already sell every car they can stamp out, and their racing heritage is already set in bedrock. Nothing to gain, lots to lose. Porsche doesn't enter because they are afraid, but rather because they aren't muppets.
Mercedes and Red Bull entered not so many years ago, and they´re in the fight. It can be done. Well, the same goes for Ferrari and they´re still there. Of course they´re afraid of entering F1. They´d be stupid if they weren´t. Let´s be honest: races are not for tech development and that crap that PR guys say, but just for plain brand awareness (or in the case of Ferrari, McLaren and other "historic" teams, just because they´ve doing that for many years and have some kind of public image to defend). Formula 1 is the undisputed king regarding brand awareness. You´ve to spend lots of money in advertising to let people know that you´ve just won Le Mans, because only petrolheads like us care about it. In Formula 1, millions of viewers can see you win live on TV. Any car manufacturer (or at least any non-American car manufacturer) would enter F1 if they had the means to do it. But Porsche is not a historic team in F1 so it has not any honor to defend, they´ve a lot of chances of being spanked like BMW, Honda or Toyota, and as someone said above, Porsche is now to endurance racing the same than Ferrari is to F1, so, why spoil such a good deal?
VW has many sporting brands it could put on an F1 nose; multiple Lemans/Daytona winning Audi or Porsche, Exotic Lamborghini, or even Bugatti...
Nissan/Renault decided that branding their motors as Infiniti suited their purposes. But in effect that's component sponsorship. When it comes to entering a car you give it the name of the brand with the greatest number of units to shift. (Ferrari is of course a special case)
They have absolutely NO reason they should enter F1 and they won't. They sell enough cars and are known in sportscar racing as the masters. End of consideration. MB
I personally believe there has always been a certain volkswagen involvement with Red Bull f1 and an engine supply has been on the cards for a while. Probably starting from Toro Rosso of which vw is already a sponsor. I've always seen RedBull f1 as a placeholder for a vw brand to come to f1 that never concretised. They're probably waiting for Eccl to be behind bars. And for that matter I wouldn't be surprised of seeing a red bovine on next year's Porsche lmp1. There were also vw talks with sauber last year on the other hand.
Mmmm.... Seems strange then that the "masters" in sportscar racing haven't won at Le Mans since 1998! The fact of the matter is, Porsche are simply not prepared to spend the vast amount money required to go F1 racing, especially as it is such a specialised series these days and the risk of an embarrassing failure is very high! As others have said, they have noted that the likes of Toyota and Honda (and to a lesser extent Ford), have tried F1 and failed miserably despite throwing massive amounts of money at it! It's a gamble that Porsche (and VW), are not prepared to take. All this: "It's not relevant to road cars" is just an excuse!, they know that if they went into F1 now they'd be lagging too far behind in the technology and aero departments and it would cost a massive amount to get the personnel in who could get them up to speed immediately! The strange thing is, Porsche fit their cars with carbon ceramic brakes, semi-auto gearboxes, traction control, active aero devices and KERS devices, all of which initially came from F1! It's also interesting to note that both Ferrari and McLaren make highly rated road cars and yet neither company relies on sportscar racing for their technology advancement! In fact, they apply their F1 know how into their road cars and then go sportscar racing! At the end of the day, Porsche do not need F1 and so are not going to bother with it. By the same token, in reality F1 does not need Porsche and are not going to miss them!
