This week the circuit of Mugello was praised by fans and drivers for its unforgivable character. The lack of asphalt run-offs played important roles in this. The call for the return of gravel traps is therefore becoming louder and louder, but they are certainly not going to be everywhere.
So much is clear from the words of FIA leader Michael Masi: "The difficulty lies in the fact that we cannot lay gravel pits everywhere on different courses. We have to come up with the ideal solution for each track and then also for every single corner. Gravel traps are not the answer to all problems everywhere".
What Masi means by this is not entirely clear, but according to Speedweek.com you can imagine that on some tracks there is no room for gravel traps and other tracks also want to take into account the wishes of other race classes.
Asphalt tracks more dangerous?
Many F1 drivers, however, would like to see the asphalt run-off strips disappear. Former world champion Jacques Villeneuve even thinks that these are dangerous because drivers would take more risks thinking that they will get away with it anyway.
The re-entry of more gravel traps is therefore not entirely unmentionable for Masi. "We have discussed this several times with the drivers, but it would have been too much for us to build gravel pits everywhere. That is simply not going to work."