Why F1 has to go big or go home with future sprint race tweaks

OPINION: Year three of Formula 1 sprint races is complete but it is still failing to pass several tests and further revisions are expected for 2024. But rather than more of the previous small modifications, grand prix bosses need to make even bigger shake-ups – or drop the format entirely...

Updated Nov 7, 2023, 10:49 AM

"If we want to keep this format, [we should] give it a go on something quite different, because I think for the last two years this sort of event hasn't brought a lot of good racing." This was Sergio Perez's view of the sprint weekend format used through 2023, as the Brazilian Grand Prix offered the final installation of six sprint events through this season.

Indications of change for 2024 have been afoot, as a scheduling shuffle looks to be on the cards to ease the restrictive parc ferme regulations that effectively lock the cars into a set-up once Friday qualifying starts. In short, the idea is to move sprint qualifying to Friday and the sprint race to Saturday morning, creating a window between it and Saturday afternoon qualifying to make any final changes.

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Author Jake Boxall-Legge

Jake studied engineering at university, as his original ambition was to design racing cars. He was bad at that, and thus decided to write about them instead with an equally limited skillset. The above article is a demonstration of that. In his spare time, Jake enjoys people, places, and things.