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Brazil, paddock, F1

"Extreme" F1 to toe the line with 'worthless' risks

Brazil, paddock, F1 — Photo: © LAT Images

"Extreme" F1 to toe the line with 'worthless' risks

Last year's São Paulo GP was threatened with logistical issues

Ian Parkes & Ewan Gale

F1 sporting director Steve Nielsen has denied the sport is 'playing with fire' with its ever-expanding calendar.

A record 22 races made up last year's schedule with triple-headers again a feature.

This year, that number will rise further with 23 events set to be run despite the ongoing threat of the Covid pandemic.

The trickiest of last year's triple-headers saw back-to-back races in Mexico, Brazil and Qatar, with the middle leg threatened by logistical issues as freight arrived late to Interlagos.

With this example ringing alarm bells for F1's hierarchy, Nielsen was asked if the sport was playing with fire with the chance of these situations escalating quickly, to which he replied: "I think Formula 1 is extreme.

"I don't think Formula 1 has ever pretended to be vanilla in any way. The logistics are another form of Formula 1 that is extreme. It is on the limit.

"We don't go into that with our eyes closed, we know what's possible, and we know what's too much, and we don't do every idea we come up with.

"Sometimes we do rule stuff out and we think, 'No, that's too risky, we won't do it.'

"So the stuff we plan and execute with our partner DHL is what we think is realistically achievable in order to deliver the calendar. So we don't take risks that we don't think are worth taking."

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