F1 News
"With hindsight, GP Australia could have just been driven."
- GPblog.com
The start of the 2020 F1 season was cancelled just three hours before the start. The threat of the coronavirus turned out to be so present that it was not safe to let the event continue. Racing Point team boss Otmar Szafnauer thinks with hindsight there could have been great racing in Albert Park that weekend.
Visitors were already on their way and some were even at the gates. The morning program had already started, but on the Friday of the Australian event it was decided that the GP would not take place. It turned out to be the start of a long postponement of the start of the season. The final calendar for 2020 is still unknown.
Despite the observed cases of virus infections at McLaren, Szafnauer of Racing Point thinks with hindsight that the event could have gone well in March. To CNN he explains: "It was difficult to predict the future in the short term in Melbourne. But looking back I think it would have been safe if we had raced."
Plans changed
The risk was very low according to the team boss. In accordance with the guidelines issued by the Australian government, there was no reason to cancel the event. "Yet there was much unknown at the time. That's why we made the most cautious choice", reports Szafnauer.
On Friday morning the team boss appeared at the circuit expecting that the weekend would continue. Apparently the plans had changed last minute.
"Friday morning at half past two the meeting in which we had decided with a majority to just race that weekend was over. We went to bed and woke up four hours later. Then all of a sudden everyone said we weren't going to race."
In the end, Szafnauer says that the only good choice was made at the time, but: "If we had raced, it would have been safe."