Porsche’s head of development rules out F1 return, claiming that Le Mans is more attractive.

As speculation that the Volkswagen Group, which owns Porsche and Audi, is looking to enter F1, drawn by the challenge of the new, environmentally aware, formula, the head of development at Porsche has ruled out such a move for his company.

"Formula One has never been an issue for us and won't be," Wolfgang Hatz told the Auto Motor und Sport website. "Le Mans is a more attractive environment for us - there are more and more competitors and we learn more about the production of road cars.”

Porsche was active in the 1.5 litre F1 in 1961-1962, finishing third overall in the 1961 championship, while Dan Gurney scored the German manufacturer’s sole world championship Grand Prix win at Rouen in 1962.

Feeling that F1 was too expensive and far removed from road cars, attention subsequently shifted to other forms of motorsport most notably Sports Cars.

The company did return to F1 in the early 80s, its water-cooled V6 turbo TAG-badged engines powering McLaren and its drivers to two Constructors' Championships and drivers' titles for Alain Prost and Niki Lauda.

Driven out once again by the high costs of the sport, Porsche returned again in 1991, this time as engine supplier to Footwork Arrows. It was not a good relationship, relying on an updated version of its McLaren unit - minus the turbo - the team failed to score a point. Indeed, in those distant days of pre-qualifying on Friday morning, Michele Alboreto, Alex Caffi and Stefan Johansson more often than not failed to even qualify for the race.

The German manufacturer returned to Sports Cars last year, finishing third overall, its best result coming in the final round in Sao Paulo where Marc Lieb, Romain Dumas and Neel Jani took victory.

Chris Balfe