Formula One Ready to Head East, Says Mosley

The Formula One World Championship is ready to move East in a bid to capitalise on the growing popularity of the sport in Asia, FIA president Max Mosley said on Thursday.

Mosley admitted that the ruling body were looking seriously at the prospect of holding future Grands Prix in such locations as India, China and the Middle East.

"I think there will be a general shift to the Middle East and Far East and that China and India are obviously very interesting candidates for the future," Mosley said. "If we had got India and China, we would have half the world population or something like it."

Mosley said he felt Moscow was the leading contender for a place on the Formula One calendar, with Turkey another serious candidate. With Asia in mind, Mosley was equivocal about the reported interest of media mogul Rupert Murdoch taking over the massive investment made by the German television group Kirch.

Kirch secured 75 per cent of the shares in Formula One holding company SLEC, who paid the FIA $313.6 million for the commercial rights to Formula One for the next 100 years. But Mosley conceded that if the Australian owner of Sky Television and other networks in Asia did take control the FIA would work hard to ensure that Formula One remained a success.

"We would do our best to work with him - we want a successful Championship after all," he added. "I don't think there should be any great difficulty."