Michael Andretti told The Associated Press "the timing was right" for him to turnover leadership of his Andretti Global racing organization to Dan Towriss, that he wasn't pushed out by IndyCar and Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Roger Penske and that he still has an ownership stake in the team, contrary to a Sportico.com report on Friday.
“We’ve been working on this for a few months now. For me where I am in my life and what I want to do, the timing was right for me to take a little different role with the team,” Andretti, who has 10-year-old twins and recently became a granfather, told AP. “A role where I don’t have to be on it every day and I can still stay involved because I’ll be involved as an advisor as well as an ambassador. We were able to come to a deal between myself and Dan and I think we are both happy with what we came up with.”
The team will continue be called Andretti Global, according to the AP story, and the current leadership will remain in place.
Andretti, who turns 62 next week, was a successful IndyCar driver, won the Indianapolis 500 five times as a team owner and is the son of legendary driver Mario Andretti. Andretti Global competes in IndyCar, Indy NXT, Formula E, Extreme E, IMSA Sportscar, Super Copa and Supercars, according to its website.
Andretti Global news: Michael Andretti 'transitioning to a more strategic role' according to Andretti Global
Andretti Global released a statement Friday that said Andretti was "transitioning to a more strategic role." The team did not respond when asked by IndyStar if Andretti would still be involved in ownership . The statement continued: "He and Dan Towriss have been working on a structure of what this could look like and have reached a direction that Michael is very happy with and believes will bring a positive future. Michael remains engaged and will continue to serve as a strategic advisor and key ambassador. We will have more to share in the coming weeks after Michael and Dan have had an opportunity to speak to the team.”
Andretti has been at the middle of controversy at times in recent years. Prior to the season-opening IndyCar race in St. Petersburg, Florida, he called for Penske to sell IndyCar if he wasn't willing to spend the necessary money to market the series. When asked by the AP if he was pushed out of IndyCar by Penske, Andretti said, "Absolutely not. I would not give Roger that much credit." Sportico , which reported that Andretti would no longer have an ownership stake in the team, is owned by Roger Penske’s son, Jay, according to the AP story.
Andretti has also been involved in a sometimes controversial effort to join Formula 1 . In January of 2024, Formula 1 rejected Andretti Global's bid for an expansion franchise for the 2025 or 2026 seasons, four months after FIA, F1's governing body, made Andretti the only finalist in the FIA's Expression of Interest process the body opened the previous spring.
F1 left the door open for Andretti as the sport's officials proposed that General Motors' plan to supply engines in F1 in 2028 -- plans the company announced in November to help bolster Andretti's F1 bid after initially attaching themselves to Michael Andretti's project as a minor manufacturing partner in January of last year -- could sway them.
But F1's owners pulled no punches in its decision that Andretti's proposal, as it stood at the time, would fail to reach F1's competitive standards while providing little value to the sport and its current stakeholders, while at the same time serving as a burden to those currently invested in the sport but cutting their return on the money the series brings in.
It's possible F1 would be more interested in accepting Andretti Global with Towriss running the company rather than the controversial Andretti but neither Andretti nor Towriss would address the F1 situation, according to the AP story.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Michael Andretti says he still has ownership stake in Andretti Global, per report
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