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It is looking increasingly likely that Audi will enter F1 in 2013 to take advantage of the new engine regulations due to be introduced for that season. An Audi F1 project has long been speculated but the companies intentions only became clear at the Paris Motor show last year when new Porsche chairman Matthias Mueller stated that he felt it made no sense for his company to compete against its sister brand (Audi) in the Le Mans series, suggesting that the company would be better served if one of the two brands was moved into Formula One.
Audi was believed to be hesitant to commit to such a move due to concerns over costs and the relevance of the sport to road car developments, but it is believed that Audi officials feel that enough changes have been made to sport in recent months by the FIA to ensure that their concerns have been addressed.
Audi’s conditions
One of the conditions of Audi’s entry into the sport was the adoption of a completely new engine formula. There were two reasons for this; firstly, Audi felt that the sport was not doing enough to make itself relevant to road car technologies. With fuel prices continuing to rise, all car companies are now being forced to focus on technologies to aid fuel efficiency, with Audi itself recently announcing a multi-billion dollar project to improve the efficiency of its models. Audi therefore felt that the sport should downsize the engines used from the current 2.4 litre V8 engines to 1.6 litre turbo charged motors. Turbo engines were last seen in F1 during the Nigel Mansell era of the 1980s (before he became famous in Money Super Market commercials) when they produced in excess of 1500bhp and burnt more fuel than a rocket ship. However, the new turbo engines smaller capacity nature will produce only 600bhp and therefore burn far less fuel. An additional 150bhp will be sourced from an increased capacity KERS system which Audi believes is vital to encourage advances in the hybrid road market.
The second more fundamental reason for Audi’s request of a new engine formula was that it believed entering a sport where the existing players have eight years of experience with the present engines to dwell would place them at a disadvantage. The completely new formula means that all the participating engine manufacturers will be forced to come up with a completely new design and eradicate the benefit of experience.
Costs
A long term deterrent which has kept Audi away from Formula One has been the excessive costs. Toyota is the prime example of this, with the Japanese giant rumoured to have ploughed in excess of $400 million per year into its eight year F1 project. During this time the Toyota F1 team failed to win a single race and didn’t once breach the top three in the constructor’s championship despite having race winning drivers Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher onboard.
However, following the withdrawal of Toyota, Honda and BMW from the sport on cost grounds the remaining teams finally realised the need to cut costs in 2009. This led to the formation of the Resource Restriction Agreement (RRA) in which all the teams agreed to gently reduce their expenditures over the course of the next three seasons. This has already benefitted the Virgin Racing team who managed to close the gap to the top teams in 2010 despite operating on an alleged $40 million budget. Given Audi’s recent increased profitability, the money required for the new low cost Formula One should not be an issue for the company.
Audi’s options
Audi is believed to have ruled out starting a new team from scratch following the failure of the Toyota F1 operation and the struggles the new teams experienced in 2010. It is believed that Audi board members believe that becoming an engine supplier to an existing, well established team would be a far more cost effective option which would provide a greater chance of success.
Former championship winners Williams are believed to be keen to secure Audi engines in order to boost their challenge. Williams hasn’t won a race since 2004 with management pinning blame of a lack of funding following the withdrawal of BMW support. Team owner Frank Williams believes that the engineering structure is now sufficiently well established to enable them to return to winning ways given Audi backing. Williams CEO Adam Parr is rumoured to have missed the vital final race of the 2010 season in order to meet Volkswagen group shareholders in an attempt to persuade them to enter the Audi brand into F1 with his team. However, it is unclear if the reluctant sacking of the highly promising young German Nico Hulkenberg in favour of paying driver Pastor Maldonado at Williams will affect the team’s chances.
It is believed that Audi’s preferred option is to supply engines to current constructors champions Red Bull Racing. Audi has an existing relationship with Red Bull due to partnerships in many of the junior motor racing categories (F3, DTM etc) and the Red Bull teams contract with Renault is scheduled to conclude in 2012. Red Bull is attractive to Audi due to its status as consistent race winners which would enable them to enter the sport and immediately have a chance to challenge for the championship. The team also has the German world champion Sebastian Vettel on its books, a driver which Audi would very much like to be associated with. Team principal Christian Horner recently refused to rule out the prospect when questioned about it and it therefore seems very likely that his team will provide a platform for that long awaited Audi F1 assault.
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are much better and more ''exotic'' solution, but lets face it, its all about money, so Audi will be there, trying to concoure F1, Porsche will probbably re-gain its domination in LMP1 class, while I don't see Lambo's plac in auto sport... You have given me a new theme for thinking 
Originally Posted by Joker
