02/06/2020
NEWS STORY
Today's confirmation of the initial 8 rounds of the 2020 season sees the sport enter one of its busiest ever periods, with two triple-headers as organizers fit the eight races into ten weekends.
Though the format of the race weekends has yet to be confirmed, while we are expecting the schedule to be reduced from three days to two, it appears that plans to have reverse-grid qualifying races on the second Saturday of the Red Bull Ring and Silverstone events will not get the all-clear.
For the proposal to move forward requires the agreement of all ten teams, and according to Mercedes it is a gimmick and consequently the German team is vetoing the proposal.
"We don't believe F1 needs gimmicks to make it attractive," the world champions told Sky Sports. "We believe in the sport to deliver excitement."
The idea was proposed due to fears that two races at the same circuit in such a short amount of time could well deliver the dame result. Consequently, it was proposed that on the second Saturday, instead of the usual qualifying session, there would be a 30 minute race, the grid for which would see the drivers line up in reverse order to their position in the world championship.
Christian Horner, whose team must go into the season opener with high hopes, Max Verstappen having won the last two Grands Prix in Austria, was all in favour of the idea.
"We've got a unique situation this year," he told Sky Sports, "and having two races at the same venue would seem the perfect time to try something different at that second event.
"Otherwise, with stable weather conditions, we're likely to have the same output in race two as we have in race one," he admitted. "The proposal seemed to get overwhelming support. The only person that wasn't particularly supportive of it was Toto because he thought it would interfere with Lewis' seventh world championship campaign, and it would be too much of a variable.
"Having races at the same venue for two consecutive weekends would be a logical and timely place to introduce and try something," he added.