"I'm devastated, won't say anything else": Mario Andretti's reaction to his team's F1 application getting rejected goes viral

F1 recently rejected Mario Andretti's bid to join the sport as a team in 2025. The American entrant was approved by the FIA after they accepted the team's Expression of Interest papers. However, they were shot down by the sport's seniors.

The news was not only a shock to the entire F1 fanbase but also to former F1 World Champion Andretti himself. He was working with his son Michael to get his team into the sport. The 83-year-old took to the X social media platform to write that he was "devastated" and could not find any other words to express himself.

"I'm devastated. I won't say anything else because I can't find any other words besides devastated."

F1 shooting down Mario Andretti's aspirations to enter the sport has not left a good taste in the F1 community. Notable personalities such as Brad Keselowski and Vincenzo Landino have empathized with the former F1 driver.

Here are some of the reactions:

Many discussed how poor F1's decision to reject the new team was. Some even pointed towards Haas and how their poor performance is ignored by F1 while a new team like Andretti, which could have added to the competition, did not even get a chance.

"It's laughable that @Formula1 and Liberty want to hold Andretti to such a high bar while teams like Haas have been around for nearly a decade with nothing to show for it. F1 is behaving like a cartel, or worse yet, like spoiled little children who don't want to share the ball," AJ Ansari wrote.

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F1's statement after rejecting Mario Andretti's bid

With the announcement of rejecting Andretti's request to join the sport, F1 also released a statement in which they explained the reason for rejecting the American team. The statement said that the new team would not bring any value to the Championship because F1 did not feel they would be competitive enough.

"Our assessment process has established that the presence of an 11th team would not, on its own, provide value to the Championship. The most significant way in which a new entrant would bring value is by being competitive. We do not believe that the Applicant would be a competitive participant."

It added:

"While the Andretti name carries some recognition for F1 fans, our research indicates that F1 would bring value to the Andretti brand rather than the other way around."

Mario Andretti is a well-known name in F1. He won a World Championship in 1978 with Team Lotus. On the other hand, his son Michael competed in a few races in 1993 and stood on a podium, securing third place.

As of now, Mario Andretti's was the only team that was successfully approved by the FIA. With them out of the picture, there are no new F1 entrants who are close to joining the grid in the future.