Binotto issues update on Audi F1 engine project

Audi chief operating officer and chief technical officer Mattia Binotto has delivered a positive update on the outfit's power unit.

The German squad will enter the sport in 2026 as an engine manufacturer, powering its own works team that will take over the Sauber-run squad currently running under the Stake name.

Its entry was confirmed two years ago as it looks to the new cycle of technical regulations to impose itself on the grid.

Binotto, who has vast experience working within the Ferrari F1 set-up, has been employed to oversee the project, with the current Red Bull sporting director Jonathan Wheatley joining next year as team principal following a period of gardening leave.

Binotto outlined his satisfaction with the progression of the power unit ahead of its debut in 2026.

“I’ve been visiting Neuberg in the last days and weeks,” he told media including RacingNews365. 

“The engine is progressing well, running on the dyno, some long distances so far already performed.”

Binotto anticipating initial 'gap' to F1 rivals

Audi is one of six power unit manufacturers that is signed up to the sport's new era in 2026, although Alpine's entry is currently up in the air.

With the other manufacturers in Red Bull-Ford, Mercedes, Ferrari and Honda already possessing knowledge of the hybrid power units, Binotto is expecting an initial gap to exist to its rivals when it joins the field.

“But I think here as well, it’s a learning process,” he said. “We are competing with other organisations where manufacturers are settled down. Certainly, all the experience is pretty important and valid.

“So while I think the organisation there is great, the facilities are great, the programmes are going ahead, still there is a learning curve, which needs to be done. So I’m expecting initially to have a gap to recover. How big it will be, I think that you can never know.

“That only by the time we will be on track that we can only understand. But we’ve got more than a year from now to then.

“There is an intense programme on the dynos in development and it will be our task to make sure that we can enforce it, speeding up as much as we can, but try to be as competitive as we can be at the start of 2026.”