Porsche: F1 Grid Limitations Led to Creation of ANDIAL Cup

Photo: Jessica Johnk/Porsche

The addition of the ANDIAL Cup to Porsche Carrera Cup North America this season has helped expand the grid beyond its allocated 40-car maximum for the Formula 1 support race rounds this year according to Porsche Motorsport North America’s one-make and sales manager Christoph von Liel.

Von Liel, who succeeds former one-make a GT sports manager Troy Bundy at PMNA beginning with this week’s pair of season-opening races at Sebring International Raceway, has explained the reasons behind the new Cup in the series.

Founded in 1975 by three German entrepreneurs in California – Arnold Wagner, Dieter Inzenhofer and Alwin Springer – ANDIAL was synonymous throughout Porsche racing in the U.S. in the 1970s and 1980s.

PMNA purchased the brand name in 2013 to associate it with various projects, which now includes Carrera Cup North America.

“With the Formula 1 races, we’re limited with the number of entries we can have because of paddock space,” von Liel told Sportscar365.

“We can have a maximum number of 40 cars for the Formula 1 races but for some of the events we have more demand and more and more customers that want to join the races.

“Instead of limiting the whole grid for the entire season to 40 cars max we said, ‘Hey, let’s do 40 cars at the Formula 1 events but for the five other events we have the chance to open the gates to more teams and customers that want to race certain races with us.’

“That’s how we came up with the ANDIAL Cup as a championship that excludes the F1 races and only pays attention to these five events.”

Bundy added: “ANDIAL Cup is available to everyone, so everyone’s entered including those doing a full season. But the additionals are all exclusive to ANDIAL Cup.

“We have five [or] six entrants on top of the 40 entrants and they’re exclusive to ANDIAL Cup because they can’t do the other events because we are sold out.

“It’s worked out great.

“We’ve got a lot of drivers that couldn’t do the full season anyway but they can come and do their classic road courses of America and it’s giving them that opportunity to still be engaged in Carrera Cup and not do the full season as well.”

Bundy, who helped expand Carrera Cup’s presence to feature on several Formula 1 weekends, said that the F1 events, which grow to three this year with the addition of the Canadian Grand Prix at Montreal, remains “extremely important” to the one-make series.

He said: “That’s something I’ve worked on, as the key project, for the last two years. We got the first one [at COTA], then the second [in Miami] and now the third [in Montreal].

“I can’t see that relationship changing in the future, if not even growing stronger between us and Formula 1.

“Globally, Formula 1 is a great partner of Porsche for Carrera Cups around the world and we saw it as an opportunity for Carrera Cup to take our platform to that market and get in front of 400,000 people at a time.

“It’s the right fit for our demographic as well in showcasing our product. I can see if opportunities come along down the track, that could potentially be expanded.”

Von Liel added: “Porsche has a close relationship with Formula 1. With the Porsche Supercup that runs in Europe, eight race events are with Formula 1.

“Worldwide, I don’t know the exact number, but out of the 23 Formula 1 races last season, I think 16-18 of them, Porsche was there with one of our one-make series.

“It’s a big part and I think here in [North America] with having three Formula 1 support races this year is massive.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John