Formula 1: Stefano Domenicali, the president of Formula 1, declared prior to the Australian Grand Prix that he is “in favour of the cancellation of free practice sessions.” The audience “doesn’t like” practice, he continued and hinted that there would be more sprint weekends in the future. Follow Formula 1 Live with InsideSport.IN.
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Currently, the Formula 1 weekend format consists of three practice rounds, a qualifying round, and main race. When the Sprint format is used, that slightly alters because one of those practise periods is given up for a second, short-form race. F1 President Domenicali has acknowledged that he would be content to remove practice sessions in near future.
Domenicali has previously expressed a desire to drastically cut the quantity of practice time that teams will have prior to a race.
He put forth a plan last year that would have reduced the number of sessions from three to just one. However such action would be very aggressive.
In an interview, Domenicali stated that he does not want to end all the practice sessions. However, he surely wants to bring changes to the existing format of this high-octane sport.
“Of course, there needs to be the time for practice, but the people are coming to see performance and the more that you give the teams and drivers the chance to see who they are, the better it is for the show,” Domenicali told Sky Sports.
While all these plans are still not confirmed, the Formula One drivers were asked about their opinions.
It was a shocker when Red Bull’s main driver, Max Verstappen mentioned he will not be around for too long. He said that in case more sprints are added to the formula one weekend, he will quit.
“Even if you change the format, I don’t find that is in the DNA of Formula 1 to do these kind of sprint races,” he said.
“I hope there won’t be too many changes, otherwise I won’t be around for too long.
“I am not a fan of it at all. When we do all that kind of stuff, the weekend becomes very intense and we already do a lot of races. But it is not the right way to go about it.
George Russell of Mercedes, who took first place in the final run in Brazil the previous year, however, supported the idea of having fewer practice sessions.
“I don’t think it’s right that Formula 1 has three times the amount of practice that you have in F3 and F2,” said Russell.
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