Brawn: If a team can’t travel to compete “we can’t have a race”

Formula 1 motorsport director has said that should teams be unable to travel to another country due to restrictions because of coronavirus then “we can’t have a race”.

The 2020 F1 season is set to start on March 15 in Melbourne, Australia but there is still doubt over the first three events on the calendar taking place.
 
Bahrain, the location of the second race, has announced restrictions on individuals that can travel including countries such as Italy and Japan due to coronavirus.
 
Italy hosts the team bases of Ferrari and AlphaTauri and the restrictions mean that some personnel would be unable to travel and be denied access to certain countries.
 
Brawn has indicated that if a team are unable to compete at an event then it would not go ahead.
 
"If a team is prevented from entering a country, we can't have a race,” he said to Reuters. “Not a Formula 1 world championship race, anyway, because that would be unfair.

"Obviously if a team makes its own choice not to go to a race, that's their decision. But where a team is prevented from going to a race because of a decision of the country then it's difficult to have a fair competition."

Should one or more teams be unable to make an event then a non-World Championship race would potentially happen.

There have been rumours that Dutch Grand Prix could become the opening event for 2020 but Brawn is trying to ensure the opening rounds go ahead.
 
"It's a very serious situation, so I don't want to underplay it. But we're trying to have races. We've got to do them in a responsible way," he added.

"We're minimizing the number of people in the paddock, we're asking the teams to send a minimum number of people they need to a race."