Saudi Arabia’s big plan to move McLaren’s F1 HQ to the Middle East

The Middle East’s involvement in F1 and sport in general has been on the up. 

Saudi Arabia are a minority stakeholder in McLaren, while Aramco - a major Saudi oil company - are one of Aston Martin’s major sponsors.

The Kingdom’s inaugural F1 race took place in 2021 in Jeddah, with plans to develop another circuit to host grands prix.

As revealed by Prince Khalid Bin Sultan Al Faisal, president of the Saudi Automobile and Motorcycle Federation, they want to create their own “racing hub” to attract manufacturers and motorsport in general

“We want to create a hub,” he told Motor Sport Magazine. “We have big companies that can help the future of motor sport. This is what we are hoping for and this is what we are working for. Hopefully we can bring one of the big manufacturers. 

“With all the investing we are doing in cars - the private investment fund bought shares in McLaren and Aston Martin - we are heading that way. Hopefully we can open and bring headquarters to Saudi Arabia or we hire people that can help us manufacture cars or technology, to create our own brands and have our own IPs [intellectual property rights].”

Saudi Arabia’s long term goal is to have a world champion in F1 and MotoGP from the country - whether that’s in the next 10, 15 or 20 years.

“We have a 20-year programme that hopefully will launch at the end of ’23, early ’24,” he added. “Our aim is not just to host international events, we want to be involved more. We want to have engineers, we want to have mechanics, we want to build cars, we want to be creative.

“We really want to have a champion, a driver that can compete in the championship for F1, who can compete in MotoGP. We are investing a lot in infrastructures, in building tracks in Saudi Arabia. 

“We want to build academies so we can be more involved: Saudi teams with Saudi drivers or other drivers to race in Saudi teams. It’s still a long way ahead but hopefully by 2030, 2035, 2040 we can achieve our goals.”

Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri comprise McLaren's F1 2023 driver line-up.