Saudi Arabia wants earlier place in calendar

Big news in the calendar for this 2021 season, Saudi Arabia intends to register in F1 for the coming years. If the first race in Jeddah will take place on December 5, Prince Khalid Bin Sultan Abdullah Al Faisal has expressed the wish to see the 2022 edition take place earlier in the calendar.

“As a promoter, we prefer to be part of the start of the season, admits the Prince. Teams can achieve good results in the first races, there can be surprises. The other races are less interesting from the promoter's point of view. Our desire is not new. From the start we wanted a race at the start of the season. We had to compromise for 2021 because we preferred to have a race at the end of 2021 than nothing at all. We will now discuss with F1 for the next season and I hope we will find an agreement. »

Prince Khalid Bin Sultan Abdullah Al Faisal is also interested in the sprint qualifier, the great innovation of the season, and hopes to organize this new format from 2022. “I was at Silverstone and I really enjoyed the new format. As a spectator and as a promoter it was great to have more action on Saturday. In Saudi Arabia, we would love to host a sprint qualifier but the decision is not ours. We will see. »

After Silverstone, the new weekend format will be implemented by F1 at Monza during the Italian Grand Prix.