Leading Formula One bosses have expressed their concerns at the loss of the traditional mid-summer break in next year's calendar.
In many of the recent seasons, the teams have been able to enjoy a three-week holiday between races in August, and, with a testing ban during that period, it has become a much-needed period of rest for the hard-working mechanics.
However, on the current provisional 2009 calendar, that gap has been closed. The races have been reformed to include fortnightly breaks all summer.
McLaren CEO Martin Whitmarsh had the following to say on this.
"I think the absence of the August break in the calendar next year is very tough. It really is tough on the mechanics.
"You look at the calendar and see how many fewer days the mechanics and the cars have in the UK."
Honda's Ross Brawn now believes that this may force teams to hire extra staff to avoid exhausting their squad of mechanics.
"The August break was introduced as a means of genuinely giving everyone a rest in the middle of tough seasons," he said.
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"Now we want to expand the number of races and not do that [exhaust the mechanics], so we end up having to look at reserve squads, back-up mechanics, and groups of people who can take over, so the other guys can get a rest.
"To have a whole race team that can't take a holiday from what would effectively be February until November is not easy.
"We've been through this before. I had the same discussion and came to a conclusion, and those conclusions seem to have been forgotten again. So, I think it's a shame."
On the other hand, the teams have also agreed that stretching the calendar to 19 races to include Abu Dhabi was a commercially viable decision.
"I think that we just have to accept that we are in the entertainment business," Whitmarsh said.
"If we are going to do another Grand Prix, it does increase our costs, but hopefully it's another show that we're putting on during the course of the year and it increases, potentially, the commercial value of Formula One.
"I think you will reach a point of saturation, but I think we're limited to 20 at the moment and we've got 19 next year.
"It worries me how hard it's going to be on the teams, but I think that's a management challenge how we're going to deal with it and make sure that we don't burn people out during the course of the season."
Sir Frank Williams has also said that the season expansion is a double-edged sword.
"We believe that the extra race was very desirable from the front end of the business and extremely hard on the race teams, and I think we will have to take on quite a few more mechanics," he said.
"These will obviously be expensive, but we can sell exposure better.
"It's hard on the people; perhaps it's a little bit better for the bank balance, but not as much as you might guess.
"Ron Dennis once said several times to Max (Mosley) and Bernie (Ecclestone) in particular, eyeball to eyeball, 'the more races you put on, the more we lose.'"
So, what do you think? Should the calendar be rescheduled to include the traditional three-week break?
Quotes retrieved from itv.com/f1
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2 months ago
Interesting stuff ... I hadnt even noticed that the gap had shortened ... So they want more mechanics but Bernie is tightening the purse strings, things are looking tight in our sport ... Things are looking tight in our country, we are facing possible reccession now aswell ... Bloody depression ! Ha ha ha !
from 2 months ago
yep, this country is falling apart, and so many think the solution to all of it is makinga certifited wally like david cameron the PM. Boris for PM!!
I think the gap has always been important, and it gives the fans a break aswell. as much as we all love the sport, I think we would rather we have a good break than sit down every other sunday with countless beers........ yeah right! lol.
should be interesting this one, with silverstone a week earlier, that will be much better for those of us that want to see both the f1 and wimbledon.
knowing Bernie, he'll get one more track to really piss off the team bosses, and make the gap just one week. wouldn't surprise me one little bit.
from 2 months ago
CAMPAIGN FOR WEEKLY GP'S ! Ha ha ha !
Yeah .. Would suit the Bernie money wagon for sure !
2 months ago
I don't know. I think that we don't need Bahrein, Singapore, Abu Dhabi, neither China. It's very expansive to travel over there, and every time when FIA comes with some new rules to cut to save the money, money goes on the other side. Traveling to far east isn't that fun, it's exhausting even for me, and i'm not mechanic, and there is not that much people who coming on races. Bring back Imola, A1 Ring, even Estoril. And i think it's enough to have just two races on the east: Japan and Australia.
In past it was different. When Ronnie Peterson became popular, Sweden urged quickly to get Grand Prix. Just cut down some races, and forget about Asia, we need some tradition as well.
from 2 months ago
ah now see, I do think that we need these countries. F1 is considered a global sport, and if those said gp's left the calendar, then it wouldn't be much of a bloabal sport would it?. I don't think it is the travelling or where they travel to that the teams are unhappy about, it is the way the races are bunched together.
yes, there is a lot of them, but I think that these are developing markets for F1 and they are proving a big success. I fthe teams don't like going there, then they must realise that they ar contradictiing themselves. They want more money from advertising, and the way to get more money is to fly to far flung places.
Imola will come back once the upgrades are finished, but Estoril will never come back because of the man next door. Quite literally, a man lives next to the track. He kicked up a fuss about the contsant testing a grand prix there, and F1 left it behind.
2 months ago
The season starts a lot later - why is that? Isn't that the cause of the 3 week break disappearing, rather than adding an additional race?
from 2 months ago
nope. adding an additional race is the cause. they had to schedule the abu dhabi correctly because of the temperatures. they ended the season as late as possible, and had to start it as late as possible. if abu dhabi wasn't there then the 3 week break would still be there.
from 2 months ago
Why did they _have_ to start it "as late as possible"? That's nearly a month later than this year. Put that month back in at the start and there's plenty of room for a three-week break in August.
e.g. Australian GP 1st March, Malaysia 8 March, Bahrain 22 March, move Turkey to 19 April. Leaves a gap between hungary on 26 july and Valencia on 23 August.
from 2 months ago
beats me mate, that's the FIA for you I guess.
about 1 month ago
They have the gap in the spring for testing. Other than it'd be a mad rush, they could move the three Asian grands prix to only a week apart as opposed to having Singapore's be two weeks before Japan's (though personally a Japanese Grand Prix that's not at Suzuka isn't a Japanese Grand Prix...)
Honestly, I'm all for having more races, but not if it takes a toll on the drivers and crew. And if it means they end up down in cash as compared with sticking to 18.
Are we going to start seeing a merry-go-round of grands prix?
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