Audi Decision Could Be To Woo Carlos Sainz

Ralf Schumacher admits he already has concerns about how Audi is going about tackling its entry into Formula 1.

The VW-linked German carmaker, which is now the 100 per cent owner of the Swiss team Sauber ahead of its official 2026 emergence as the works Audi team, was recently struck by rumours of an internal F1 power struggle.

It has resulted in Sauber chief executive and chairman Andreas Seidl and Oliver Hoffman, respectively, being ousted by Audi CEO Gernot Dollner.

“It’s a very big deal,” former F1 driver Schumacher told Sky Deutschland. “Changing personnel even before the start is very interesting.”

Some think Audi made the decision because, amid the Seidl and Hoffman in-fighting, Sauber has languished and stagnated at the very bottom of the 2024 standings – not even scoring a single point so far.

But Schumacher thinks Seidl was operating with one hand behind his back.

“The Audi project was actually on the brink of collapse because there was apparently a small calculation error amounting to 1 billion,” said the German. “At least that’s what we hear.

“The team had to be refinanced because no money was coming in. That’s why the decision was made to keep Zhou Guanyu as a driver and take the money,” Schumacher explained.

“Accordingly, nothing could happen. They couldn’t hire any people and couldn’t offer any prospects. So they just let the whole thing run as it was before.

“With all the sympathy I have for the team, a lot of things have to change at Sauber. But Andi Seidl was fighting with blunt weapons at that moment.”

The good news, Schumacher argues, is that the project “has at least managed to get an experienced man in Mattia Binotto – which is important.

“They just have to be aware that in Formula 1, constant personnel changes at the management level are not a good thing. It’s not a corporation – it’s a Formula 1 team.

“So what they’ve done is difficult for me to understand. Binotto is certainly someone who can do a good job, but this is also a huge task for him.”

Schumacher thinks another silver lining amid the Audi turmoil is that Binotto, the former Ferrari boss, gets along very well with the seat-hunting Carlos Sainz.

“Binotto is a convinced fan and friend of Sainz,” said the 6-time grand prix winner. “So there could also have been politics in the background.

“Maybe they (Sainz) said ‘We would like to have this and that person to support us’. The two know each other from Ferrari and really enjoyed working together, so that could be where the wind is blowing from.”