The inaugural 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix saw George Russell fall sick upon leaving the venue. Not just him, but a few members of the Mercedes F1 team also fell sick due to the Las Vegas-Abu Dhabi doubleheader. Now, Russell came out to slam the excruciating 24-race-a-season, calling it unsustainable.
Speaking about this, Russell said in a report published by SpeedCafe, “Everybody up and down the paddock – I’ve got so many mechanics who are ill, people in the engineers’ office.”
“They have really struggled with the constant timezone shifts, the body not knowing where you are, eating at different times, staying in different hotels, different environments, different climates. The body’s getting confused.”
P2 in the standings ✌️ pic.twitter.com/oYQJKpl8H1
— George Russell (@GeorgeRussell63) November 26, 2023
Admittedly, F1 is known as the rotating circus as it involves rigorous travel. Teams and personnel travel with their equipment and relocate to different parts of the world, at times every week. This, in return, takes a huge toll on the people involved in the sport, something Max Verstappen also pointed out.
Due to different time zones, at times it gets difficult for the personnel to adapt to the situation. However, Russell, also revealed that there are talks about simplifying the situation in the coming year.
What are the changes F1 is proposing to battle such situations?
According to Mohammed Ben Sulayem, the FIA chief, the best solution to this problem would be working on the calendar. He also proposed changes in the calendar and the way the races are placed one after the other.
This is something F1 chief Stefano Domenicali was made to agree with as Ben Sulayem added, “If you look at the calendar for 2024, I’ve asked before, and said to Stefano, you cannot go on like this. When it comes to the pollution, for the environment, it’s huge, but more than that, it’s the fatigue on the staff, and it is fatigue.”
– The Formula One 2024 calendar@F1#f1#Formula1 pic.twitter.com/scxIJTQQi9
— CANALEF1 (@caanalef1) December 5, 2023
Notably, George Russell also mentioned the change in personnel throughout the season. For instance, the teams can replace and rotate personnel so that they don’t have to do every single race.
The 2024 F1 season will see 24 races, two more than this year. Even though this year’s calendar also had a 24-race schedule, China and Italy’s [Emilia Romagna] cancellation of the race reduced it to 22.
Some races have been moved to fit regionally [such as Japan moving to earlier in the calendar after China]. Yet, several races like Canada, Miami, and Qatar are outliers which can cause a quick turnaround. Thus, the calendar will have almost the same format of traveling across the world throughout the season.
