According to reports in the Italian press, the managing director of Formula 1, Stefano Domenicali, supports the expansion of the field of the first category and wants to see twelve teams on the grid as early as 2026.
At the beginning of the year, the FIA announced a tender for teams wishing to join the King class, two of which – if they meet the strict criteria – could join the field in 2025, 2026 or 2027. According to the news, there is no shortage of interested parties. And there are certainly more than two projects applying to participate in F1.
As far as the expansion of the field is concerned, based on the news so far it has been mainly supported by the FIA, the existing teams are already divided on this subject. According to the foul language, many people fear that as the number of teams increases, their “salaries” from the distribution of commercial income will decrease.
The amount of money that all newcomers have to pay as a kind of initial entry fee serves to appease them to an extent. This amount is currently 200 million dollars. However, according to the news, from 2026, a much larger amount will be included in the new Concorde agreement, which may reach a billion dollars.
Italy’s Formu1aUno has also written about the matter, confirming that according to its own sources, F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali supports expanding the field and would be happy if there were two new teams on the starting grid by 2026.
The increase in entry fees is said to make the idea of expansion more palatable to the big teams as well. Ferrari, for example, is already open to supporting the idea and signing the new Concorde Agreement (which sets out all the other trilateral commercial agreements besides entry fees) as soon as possible.
Over the weekend in Barcelona, serious negotiations were said to have taken place on the subject: Domenicelli “in and out” of Ferrari’s hospitality units to negotiate with team principal Frédéric Vasseur. Meanwhile, Guenter Steiner, Director of Haas, revealed that serious discussions are taking place around the new agreement, and in his opinion, the sooner the ink dries on the agreement that will enter into force in 2026, the better.
Frederic Vasseur (Photo: XPB)
