‘Timing was right’ for Andretti handoff to partner

Motorsports icon Michael Andretti told The Associated Press on Sunday he’s at a point in his life where he no longer wants to run the day-to-day of his global operation and that’s why he turned over leadership to his business partner.

No, Dan Towriss did not steal Andretti Global out from under one of the most successful racers in American history.

Towriss, owner of Gainbridge and holding company Group 1001, has slowly grown from a sponsor of one of Andretti’s IndyCar teams to one of the biggest spenders in motorsports. But at least two years ago, Towriss bought an ownership stake in Andretti Global and became part of the entire organization.

And no, Andretti said with firm denial, he was not pushed out of IndyCar by series owner Roger Penske. “Absolutely not. I would not give Roger that much credit,” Andretti told AP.

Andretti and Penske were at odds the entire season when Andretti opened the year by calling on Penske to sell IndyCar if Penske wasn’t willing to spend the capital to properly market the series.

So why now? The real reason for him stepping away, Andretti told AP, is that he turns 62 next week and has spent his entire life in racing. His father, Mario, is a Formula 1 world champion, Indianapolis 500 winner and four-time IndyCar champion.

Michael Andretti has twin 10-year-old children, two weeks ago became “Nonno” for the first time when son Marco welcomed a daughter, and has multiple business entities to fill his time.

For reasons Andretti, who is a bit of introvert, couldn’t even explain, it was simply time for him to take a step back. He will still have some sort of role — he doesn’t know what or how many races he’ll even go to — but the name Andretti Global will remain intact.

“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 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.”

Andretti Global fields cars in IndyCar for Colton Herta, who won the series finale and finished second in the final standings, Marcus Ericsson and Kyle Kirkwood. It fields teams across seven total series and on Monday will give female driver Jamie Chadwick a test in an Indy car. Andretti Global also supports the two teen young sons of the late Dan Wheldon.