Here's why Mercedes prefers Audi over Andretti Motorsports as F1's 11th team

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff feels Audi getting added to the sport as the 11th team would be a much better proposition than Andretti. According to Wolff, while Andretti is a great name and is respected in the motorsport world, it cannot have the kind of impact in terms of market penetration in unexplored areas or in general marketing of the sport that a brand like Audi would have.

Speaking to the media about Andretti joining as the 11th team, the Mercedes boss said:

“Andretti is a great name, and I think they have done exceptional things in the US. But this is sport and this is business and we need to understand what is it that you can provide to the sport. And if an OEM or an international, multinational group joins F1 and can demonstrate that they are going to spend X amount of dollars in activating, in marketing in the various markets; that’s obviously a totally different value proposition for all the other teams.’’

He added:

“With 10 franchises that we hope can increase the value, and you’re certainly not going to increase the value by just issuing new franchises to people that cannot increase the overall value of Formula 1.’’

Toto Wolff, on his part, is enjoying a somewhat lukewarm summer break. Mercedes was in splendid form in the last few races with multiple double podium finishes. At the same time, the team has not won a single race in the first half of the season.

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Mercedes boss claims they need to be humble

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff was cautious after a strong weekend for the team in Hungary and put strong emphasis on the need to stay humble at this stage of the season. In his view, the team is yet to reach its goal and cannot afford to get complacent. He said:

“Today, we had good pace, but we need to stay humble and look at race weekend after race weekend so we can try to gain more learnings and experiment to put us in a situation where we can actually fight for wins at the end of the season.’’

The team has not had the best of seasons, but its comeback in the championship has been quite impressive to say the least. It will be interesting to see what Mercedes can do in the second half of the 2022 season.