Porsche make F1 and IndyCar stance very clear after collapsed Red Bull deal

For any fans hoping to see Porsche in either Formula 1 or IndyCar anytime soon, the German brand has issued an alarming update.

With new chassis and power unit regulations coming for F1 2026, Porsche had been in negotiations with Red Bull over a partnership involving their newly-created Red Bull Powertrains division. Talks would break down though, opening the door for Ford to come in as Red Bull’s partner.

Porsche not heading for Formula 1 or IndyCar

As F1 2026 draws closer, Porsche motorsport boss Thomas Laudenbach was quizzed on whether, down the line, the brand was still weighing up a fresh push to enter Formula 1? The answer was no.

“It is off the table: right now F1 is not a task for us and we are not spending any energy on that,” he is quoted by Motorsport.com.

“We are only focused on what we do right now, and if you look at it, we have many different activities: we are well-occupied and extremely happy with what we do.

“We are engaged in customer racing from track days, GT4, one-make series up to professional GT racing [in GT3].

“On top of that we are racing in the two most important endurance racing series [the World Endurance Championship and IMSA SportsCar Championship] with our partner Penske.

“The third part, since electrification of our brand is very important, is our engagement in Formula E, which is the only full-electric series on a high level.

“I think we are really well served.”

And just like F1, a crack at IndyCar is also not on the agenda for Porsche.

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But while Porsche is not coming to Formula 1, a fellow Volkswagen Group brand in the form of Audi is, which will take over Sauber and morph it into the Audi works team.

However, with the team to operate out of Sauber’s base in Hinwil Switzerland, while Audi’s German hub carries out power unit work, ex-F1 team boss Eddie Jordan believes Audi is taking the “fundamentally wrong” approach by not basing their team in the UK.

“I have a question mark over Audi in the full stop,” said Jordan on the Formula For Success podcast, where he appears alongside co-star David Coulthard, a 13-time F1 race winner.

“You and I are particularly good friends with Allan McNish [Audi motorsport director of coordination] and we wish him well there, but that’s a big, big task he’s taken on, big, big operation. To build a car, to run it out of Switzerland, with manufacturing, it’s a big, big, big ask.

“When did you last see a Swiss or a German [based] team win a world title?

“We saw what Toyota did. They came in, they tried to do it that way and then it didn’t work. And the amount of teams that has done, it’s cost fortunes.

“And so it’s a big ask. And I have to say there is no better way to run a race car than through Britain and particularly in that area of Northampton, Oxfordshire and various other places. They’ve just got such a wealth of knowledge. They’ve just got such a mindset of being able to win or to achieving or getting the best.

“And the suppliers in the region understand the complexities and the timeframes that people are on there. Whereas, you know, you go out and you order a piece of machinery to be done in Switzerland. They will give you a timeline of maybe needing four days, four weeks, four months and there’s nothing you can do.

“Whereas if you’re in the UK, you would just sit on top of that supplier and say, ‘If you don’t do this, you just don’t get any more work. So you better drop everything and do it.’ And they work night and day to get it done.

“So that’s the philosophy that there is a racing culture, it’s in the DNA, and I think what Audi are doing is fundamentally wrong.”

One-half of Audi’s F1 driver line-up is fixed in the form of Nico Hulkenberg, as the search continues for his future team-mate.

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