Red Bull and Carlos Sainz have suggested Formula 1 simply try one reverse grid sprint race if for nothing more than to end the “curiosity”.
Over the past two years, F1 bosses have tried on several occasions to swap the usual qualifying format with a 30-minute sprint race where the grid is formed by reversing the championship order at a handful of races
The most recent push was to try it on the second weekend at circuits which have hosted multiple races this year, ie. Red Bull Ring and Silverstone, but it was blocked by Mercedes.
And another attempt for 2021 is also now looking increasingly unlikely to succeed with as many as four teams rumoured to be opposed.
One team though continually backing at least a trial is Red Bull and now team boss Christian Horner is suggesting a non-championship race to give it a go.
“It’s conflicting in many ways, the racer in you and the purist says it’s absolutely the wrong thing to do,” he said via The Race.
“And then of course you see a race a little bit like in Monza and that brings the point to the fore again of mixing things up.
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“Obviously, the best way of mixing things up is something like a reverse grid. That is artificial, but inevitably when you have the fastest car starting at the front of the race you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out that in many cases they’ll stay in grid order.
“So I think that Formula 1 shouldn’t be scared of perhaps trying something different, and if there was an occasion, a type of venue, an invitation race or maybe even a non-championship race that something like that could be tried, it would be very interesting to see what the outcome of it would be.
“If you don’t try something you never know, and I think it’s very easy to get stuck into a rut of saying ‘that’s ridiculous, it wouldn’t work’.”
Horner also suggested it could be a way to offer those circuits such as Nurburgring, Imola and Mugello an opportunity to hold a race in the future.
“We’ve got all these great new circuits that are pushing for races this year that we won’t be able to accommodate in future years,” he added
“If one event was selected to try a different format, to try something totally different, what would we have to lose?”
Carlos Sainz echoed his former employer, admitting the recent race at Monza had created an interest to consider it.
“I am a bit curious to know what would happen in F1 with reverse-grid races,” he said.
“I have the curiosity to potentially try it one day to see how it goes and see how it spices up things and what happens with Formula 1 in general when you introduce that format.”
But at the same time…
“It makes me think the current format with closer racing and closer car performance would be perfectly okay, potentially in 2022,” said Sainz.
“If we manage to get the field closer we will have loads of Monza races, with Lewis [Hamilton], Ferrari hopefully, McLaren and company.
“But at the same time, I am like ‘Why not try once and see what happens’.”