After a major calendar reshuffle, there will be no Grand Prix on the weekend of June 11-13. This will happen after the race in Azerbaijan.
The French GP, which was taking place on June 25-27, will now be held a week earlier on June 18-20. This will kickstart a triple-header considering it will be followed by two races in Austria.
The first race, known as the Styrian GP, will run on the original French GP date of June 25-27, with the Austrian GP on its current date of July 2-4.
The sport took some time to consider various possibilities after the UK government placed Turkey on the red-list due to rising Covid-19 cases.
The scenario became more complicated as it required any traveler visiting Turkey to undergo a 10-day quarantine in a designated hotel. The second option was to stay on the road before moving to France.
As both options were not favourable, the race that was initially created to replace the Canadian GP had to be put on hold.
Via a statement, F1 added, “We are grateful to the Turkish promoter for their support in recent days and the recognition that the current travel situation made the race in June impossible.
“We are equally grateful to the Provence-Alpes Cote d’Azur region and French Grand Prix promoter for their flexibility, and the Austrian promoter for their enthusiasm to host a second race at short notice following the huge success of the two races in Austria in 2020.”
Just last season, there were a lot of cancellations and postponement of numerous Grand Prix. This led to back-to-back races in Austria in early July.
F1 CEO explains reason
F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali said, “We were all looking forward to racing in Turkey but the travel restrictions in place have meant we are not able to be there in June.
“Formula 1 has shown again that it is able to react quickly to developments and find solutions and we are delighted that we will have a double-header in Austria meaning our season remains at 23 races.
“I want to thank the promoter and authorities in Turkey for all of their efforts in recent weeks and want to thank the promoters in France and Austria for their speed, flexibility and enthusiasm in accommodating this solution.
“We have had very good conversations will all the other promoters since the start of the year and continue to work closely with them during this period.”
Revised F1 calendar of forthcoming races
Monaco – May 23
Azerbaijan – June 6
France – June 20
Styria – June 27
Austria – July 4
Great Britain – July 18
Hungary – August 1
Belgium – August 29
Netherlands – September 5
Monza – September 12
Russia – September 26
Singapore – October 3
Japan – October 10
United States – October 24
Mexico – October 31
Brazil – November 7
Australia – November 21
Saudi Arabia – December 5
Abu Dhabi – December 12
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