Argentina’s push for an Argentina F1 return has moved from wishful thinking to presidential lobbying. Javier Milei used a Buenos Aires meeting with FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem to declare that the country wants Formula 1 back after a near-30-year absence — and to make clear who he sees as the face of the campaign.
“We have the tradition, we have the drivers, and we are now regaining the institutional credibility that these categories demand before a country is chosen,” Milei said, according to Motorsport.com. “We have absolutely everything. It is time to go full throttle in this direction. Let’s move forward together at full speed to make this dream a reality. We want to see Colapinto back in the country.”
Why the Argentina F1 return talk is louder than ever
The answer is largely one driver. Franco Colapinto has become the most marketable Argentinian sportsman of his generation since arriving in F1, and he is now settled at Alpine alongside Pierre Gasly having agreed terms to stay with the team into 2027. He also completed a show run in Argentina earlier this year that gave the government a taste of the demand.
Argentina last hosted a world championship grand prix in 1998, at the Autódromo Oscar y Juan Gálvez in Buenos Aires. That circuit is the centre of the current plan. It is being rebuilt to host MotoGP next year, and the work has been scoped with a wider ambition in mind: a new pit building, a remodelled layout and an extension that stretches the track from 4.3km to 4.87km — a length chosen with F1 in mind.
Construction began in January and the project is roughly 60 per cent complete. At $150million it is the largest investment in the venue’s history, and when finished the circuit is expected to hold more than 150,000 spectators.
What the FIA president actually said
Ben Sulayem was in the country for the FIA’s American Congress and toured the site while he was there. “With Formula 1, today I saw the circuit,” he told reporters. “A lot of investment is going on.”
That is encouragement rather than endorsement, and the distinction matters. The FIA does not sell grand prix slots; Formula 1’s commercial rights holder does. A circuit that satisfies the FIA’s homologation requirements has cleared a technical hurdle, not a commercial one, and no promoter agreement has been announced.
Buenos Aires head of government Jorge Macri was similarly ambitious about the facility itself. “We are making the most significant investment in the history of the Autódromo de la Ciudad,” he said. “We dream of the return of Formula 1, which is why we are completely transforming the track and facilities so that it meets all the requirements and becomes an icon of Buenos Aires on the world stage.”
The queue is long and the calendar is full
This is where enthusiasm meets arithmetic. The 2026 schedule is already at its practical ceiling, with Madrid added this season and Imola back in the running for a slot. Every existing promoter is paying to keep its date, and several long-standing European rounds are on rolling short-term deals precisely because there are more suitors than weekends.
An Argentinian round would also compound F1’s travel problem. South America currently gets one race, in Brazil; adding a second would either need to be paired with it logistically or accepted as an outlier on a calendar that is already under scrutiny for its freight and flight footprint.
None of that makes the bid frivolous. Argentina has hosted 20 world championship grands prix, produced five-time champion Juan Manuel Fangio, and now has a genuinely popular driver on the grid plus a government willing to spend nine figures on the venue. MotoGP arriving in 2027 will be the real test: deliver that weekend well, and the Argentina F1 return conversation becomes a negotiation rather than an aspiration.
For now, though, the honest position is the one the paddock will recognise. There is a circuit being built, a president making promises, and no date on any calendar.
