F1 team that scored zero points fighting for return as 12th team could join the grid
F1 could be welcoming a familiar name back to the paddock.
Kuwaiti investor Saad Kassis-Mohamed is pushing to bring the Caterham F1 team back to the grid as early as 2027, completing an unlikely comeback. The British auto manufacturer appeared in the series between 2012 and 2014, but never claimed a point during their three-year existence. The organisation initially entered F1 in 2010 as Lotus Racing (also known as Team Lotus), but team owner Tony Fernandes applied to change the name to Caterham after acquiring the British car company.
At the same time, Renault changed the moniker of its squad to Lotus, causing one of the sport’s more confusing naming sagas. Unfortunately for Fernandes and Caterham, the freshly rebranded venture was wildly unsuccessful. In 2012, Heikki Kovalainen and Vitaly Petrov combined to record a best finish of 11th in Abu Dhabi, and this would remain the team’s best single-race result. They ended the year pointless, although their best result was enough to beat Marussia and HRT.
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The 2013 season produced a new driver pairing in Charles Pic and Giedo van der Garde, but the car was much less competitive. They slumped to 11th in the Constructors’ Championship standings, and Pic’s 14th-place finishes in Malaysia and South Korea were the highlights of a miserable year.
In 2014, things fell apart. After another pointless campaign and an ill-fated mid-season takeover, the team entered administration and missed the races in Texas and Sao Paulo. They returned briefly in Abu Dhabi, but the organisation was dissolved before the 2015 season got underway.
Now, however, after over a decade away from the sport, Caterham could make a surprise return. Kassis-Mohamed has announced his intention to revive the squad under the provisional SKM Racing moniker, subject to approval from the FIA and Liberty Media.
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The new organisation will split operations between a technical base at Silverstone, keeping it close to the heart of British motorsport, and a race operations setup in Munich. If successful, Caterham would rejoin the F1 grid as early as 2027.
“F1 now operates with clearer financial guardrails and stable technical frameworks, making the category investable,” Kassis-Mohammed told Sportstar. “We like the intersection of elite engineering, a global platform, and predictable cost governance.”
He added: “We respect the thresholds set by [the] FIA [and] F1. Our plan involves two options: a change of control transaction in an existing entrant or applying in the next FIA process as a compact, well-funded customer team with long-term PU supply.”