Formula One has revealed a revised weekend schedule for the 2018 season.
All of the 21 Grands Prix on this year’s calendar will begin at ten-past the hour, instead of on the hour. The move is to help broadcasters in areas such as America where coverage begins on the hour. F1 bosses say the move will aid such broadcasters to convey the ‘the tension and emotion that characterise the minutes before the start of each Grand Prix’.
Furthermore, in a move to help boost TV audience figures, every European and Brazilian race on the calendar will start an hour later than in 2017. On these weekends, the entire weekend schedule will be pushed back by an hour, meaning that Qualifying will also start an hour later than previously scheduled. The French Grand Prix has also been pushed back further in the afternoon in order to avoid a clash with the FIFA World Cup.
The news follows Formula One’s decision to drop grid girls for the 2018 season.
After graduating in 2015 with a First Class honours degree in English Language and Literature, Nicky Haldenby, a lifelong fan of Formula 1, founded the Lights Out F1 Blog in 2016. Now in its sixth season, the blog has become a firm fan-favourite, delving deep into the sport’s history books and lifting the cover on unusual F1 statistics. Nicky also writes at F1Destinations and GPDestinations. In 2017 and 2018, he wrote for Badger GP. Nicky is also the host of the F1 Rewind Podcast and can be heard as the resident stats man on the 2 Soft Compounds Podcast.