Formula 1 continues to try and generate more revenue in all sorts of ways. Although F1 boss Stefano Domenicali did not want a two-day race weekend, it seems to be a serious solution for more races in the future. Lewis Hamilton sees advantages and disadvantages.
The seven-time world champion experienced a similar weekend at the 2020 Eifel GP. Due to bad weather, Friday's free practice sessions were cancelled, giving the team much less time to set up the car in the best way possible. Hamilton then found that it gave a whole new dynamic to the race weekend.
Deletion of Friday sessions increases difficulty
The Englishman states in conversation with Autosport that the difficulty level went up. "I think it just made it so much harder for us. Normally you have two sessions on the Friday, you get time to make tons of different set-up changes, and if you're on the back foot, you've got time to catch up."
"When you start on a Saturday, you've got no time," Hamilton continued. "You've got that one session to really get on top of it and the set-up between practice and qualifying. It made it so hard." In addition, the driver believes the removal of Friday sessions is important for nature. “There are 22 days less of 20 cars bombing around the track and polluting the air, the planet, so that's a positive."