Singapore GP Goes Further into Darkness
After Scuderia Toro Rosso team manager Massimo Rivola attended the recent MotoGP night race at Qatar’s Losail International Circuit he expressed concern over scheduling of F1’s first night event in Singapore.
Under the original schedule there would only have been one and a half hours of running in the dark before the night time qualifying session on Saturday.
He told autosport.com after that experience: “Personally I am not relaxed, let me put it like this. Honestly, I would like to test but it is not possible and too expensive to realise. I am sure it will be fine in the end, but there are still some points to discuss.
“The most important is that our schedule should be all over the night, rather than split between day and the night. The sunset in Singapore is at 7pm and at the moment the plan is to have first practice finish at 6pm and second practice to start at 8pm.”
Rivola’s concerns were reviewed by the F1 teams and the FIA with the resulting change in schedule and F1 teams were informed about the latest version of the timetable in Turkey last weekend
The new schedule is as follows:
Practice 1 Friday 19:00-20:30
Practice 2 Friday: 21:30-23:00
Practice 3 Saturday 19:00-20:00
Qualifying Saturday: 22:00-23:00
Race Sunday: 20:00
Autosport also understands that the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association (GPDA) is pushing for some kind of acclimatisation session on the track on the Thursday before the race – although whether this is in F1 cars or other machinery is not yet known.
Cross Posted @ F1 Rage!
Technorati Tags: Formula One, Losail International Circuit, Motorsport, Sports, Scuderia Toro Rosso, Auto Racing, Singapore Grand Prix, F1 Rage, Asian Motor Sports
I’ve got the funniest feeling all these objections are a storm in a tea cup & that the night race will go off without a hitch.
The bloody track is going to be lite up like New York city, try driving the Muslane straight & chicanes at LeMan, at one in the morning with nothing but a set of headlights.
Anything to appease the primma-donnas Peter.
Next thing will be complaints after a shunt and they blame being blinded by the electronic green lights.
This is what happens when the powers-that-be give everyone else the mushroom treatment. If the FIA had allowed for some properly-organised nocturnal testing soon after the idea was confirmed, then the drivers would be able to see for themselves the effectiveness or otherwise of the measures in use. For instance, they would know what the situation was with the Digiflag - which was quietly tested at the Turkish GP weekend.