F1 confirms Monza to host second sprint qualifying

Silverstone played host to F1’s first-ever sprint race last weekend on Saturday with a 100km race being run to decide the grid for the grand prix.

Monza has been officially announced as the second venue that will trial the new format, although this has been widely known for some time.

F1 has revealed that Monza will follow the same timetable to Silverstone with qualifying taking place on Friday evening after a single practice session.

FP2 remains on Saturday morning before the sprint, while the grand prix takes place on Sunday as normal.

The sprint race at Monza will be 18 laps, starting at 1630 local time on Saturday. 

Sunday’s grand prix will start 1500 local time on September 12.

F1 also confirmed that the format will be decided at an undecided flyaway race. 

Brazil was tipped to be the chosen destination but growing concerns about rising coronavirus rates mean F1 is leaving its options open.

Speaking in his post-race column, Ross Brawn said: “I’m very pleased with F1’s first Sprint weekend. Our belief was that it would add more engagement for fans across three days – and it definitely did. I don’t see how it did anything other than enhance the race weekend.

“The fact that teams had less time to practice had a significant impact on the weekend. Red Bull had a car with a bit more wing on it so were slower down the straight. Mercedes went for a lower drag setting, which gave Lewis the opportunity. If they were starting again, one or both might have done something different. Teams crave perfection and that’s great because it’s F1, but sometimes a bit of jeopardy is great for the fans.

“If you look at the weekend as a whole, we had different options on tyres for both the sprint and Sunday’s grand Prix. We had a great day overall on Friday, with an exciting qualifying that was watched by a bumper crowd.We’ll go away and reflect on the format in the next week or two. I’m sure there will be things we can pick up with teams and then digest the feedback. It’s a great first step in this experiment, with two more sprints to come. I want to emphasise that we won’t make a judgment on whether it will be part of our championship in the future until we have done all three sprints on three different tracks.”