Lewis Hamilton and Daniel Ricciardo led the way as drivers supported Formula 1’s decision to cancel the Australian Grand Prix.
Week-long fears of the threat posed by the Coronavirus were realised when a McLaren team member tested positive late on Thursday in Melbourne.
That triggered a night of meetings and speculation over whether the race weekend would go ahead, with final confirmation coming just two hours before the scheduled start of practice on Friday.
“Sadly, this the right decision,” Hamilton posted on Instagram. “No one wants this, we all want to get in our cars and get racing, but we have to be realistic and we must put health and safety first.
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“The reality is, this is really serious with people dying every day, lots of people ill and even if they are not ill, many people being affected financially and emotionally.
“No one really knows the extent of what we are dealing with, but we should all take precautions to keep as many people as safe as possible.
“I know it’s disappointing, as sport unites us when times are tough, but it’s the right call. Listen to the advice everyone, keep safe. Hope to be back racing soon but in the meantime look after yourselves.”
For Renault driver Daniel Ricciardo there is the double disappointment of a delayed start to the F1 season plus the cancellation of his home race Down Under.
“I wanted my season started, I wanted to race at home, it is just unfortunate that it happened late,” he told reporters arriving home at Perth Airport.
“Everyone was there ready to go. When you see everything else around the world kind of shut down, it seems with our knowledge that it is the right call.
“I’ll stay ready, train, stay for and healthy and get ready for the call when we are going racing.”
With the next two races in Bahrain & Vietnam now postponed and a potential delay until the Azerbaijan GP in June, Ricciardo is still confident he’ll hit the track at some point in 2020.
“Absolutely, we have just got to be patient,” he added.
Across the grid, drivers’ responses can be summed up as disappointed but understanding of the decision that was made.
Though two veterans, Sebastian Vettel & Kimi Raikkonen, perhaps weren’t as sad as they had already left Australia well before any official announcement was made, according to the BBC.
And on Thursday, Vettel had already suggested drivers could step in to cancel the weekend if race officials didn’t should the situation have worsened.
“I hope others would agree, and we hope it doesn’t get that far, but if it were to get that far then for sure you pull the handbrake,” he said before McLaren’s positive case was announced.
“I think we are a group of 20 guys and I think we’ve got together over the last years for various circumstances on various topics, and I think we share a common opinion on big decisions and that.
“I would qualify it is a very, very big decision and ultimately, as I said before, you look at yourself.
“And we would, I think, be mature enough to look after ourselves and pull the handbrake in that case.”