Esteban Ocon in Baku - Photo: Race Pictures

‘Sunday was the highlight’: Criticism detailed over more F1 Sprints

10:53, 30 Sep

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byKada Sarkozi

Esteban Ocon is not in favour of having more Sprints and reverse grids in Formula 1.

"Formula 1 has to be the pure kind of racing that we watched when we were young."

- Esteban Ocon

According to the French driver, people want to consume too quickly, which also takes away the build-up from Formula 1 Grands Prix.

"I think we are living now in a consumer world where we want more and more shows, we want more races. When we watch 'Wednesday' on Netflix we don't want to wait 10 days for the second part of the season.

"But when it's done then we really quickly forget things and we go on the next one, because we have so much content to watch and it's the same thing for sports. It's the same thing for anything now because we have the choice, we have a lot of entertainment."

Esteban Ocon in action at the 2025 Azerbaijan GP - Photo: Race Pictures

"I remember when I was young and I was waiting so much for the next race, and it was actually quite long to wait. It was the big highlight of my week when [on] Sunday, [it] was [time for] the Grand Prix, finally.

"You had to watch qualifying, you had the build-up to it, and then you watch the Grand Prix, it was the big highlight.

"Now we already race almost every week. And to have a sprint on top, yes, it's a lot more content, for sure it will have more views because we are racing on Saturday. I believe it's probably a bit too much.

"I don't mind racing more. I will always be happy to race more, but I kind of prefer to have that expectation building up to the Grand Prix and enjoying what you're watching."

Ocon also against reverse grids

Despite the fact that such rule change would currently help Haas, the Frenchman would not support having reverse grids in the competition.

"I think that's quite artificial to be fair. Formula 1 has to be the pure kind of racing that we watched when we were young, be the quickest that wins and the strongest team that wins.

"Having a reverse grid, yes, again it's more show, but it would be artificial. It will bring opportunities for us that we are not the quickest on the sprint race maybe, but on the proper Grand Prix I think everyone will go back to what pace they have."

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