FIA president Jean Todt has praised the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, claiming it has “all the ingredients” to be a Formula 1 venue again.
The former Ferrari boss is back at the Brickyard as a guest to watch Sunday’s Indianapolis 500, the showpiece event of the IndyCar calendar, where Fernando Alonso will again look to win and join Graham Hill as the only drivers to complete motorsport’s Triple Crown.
However, when current owner Roger Penske bought the historic Speedway last year, he did raise the possibility of bringing F1, which raced there between 2000-2007, back in the coming years.
And that would be a venture Todt fully supports.
“The responsibility of the calendar is with the commercial rights holder, but clearly Indianapolis has all the ingredients of a Formula 1 venue, all the facilities,” he told Motorsport.com.
“Roger Penske and his group have taken the lead, and I was very impressed with what I saw this morning.
“All the improvements have been done in a very short time. Roger has already achieved quite a lot with facilities that were already very impressive.
“Indianapolis is a kind of Silicon Valley of motor racing in the U.S. so of course if the Formula 1 Commission proposed to have a race at Indianapolis, it would be very good for Formula 1.”
Of course, normally the Indy 500 is a May event, typically sharing the same date as the Monaco Grand Prix, but has been pushed back to August due to the Covid-19 pandemic which remains in full effect in America.
As a result, no fans will fill the immense grandstands at IMS but Todt has praised the way motorsport around the world has been able to get back on track in recent months.
“I think it’s remarkable and commendable to see all the efforts that have been done in different championships – in Formula 1, in Formula E, in endurance, in IndyCar and all motorsport categories – to make motor racing alive again at this time,” he said.
“The easy solution would be to wait until life is back to normal, but we don’t know when it will be. So it’s essential to restart and I commend all the work that has been done, including of course at Indianapolis.”