Verstappen: New F1 Sprint format makes more sense

In the fourth season since its introduction, F1 is still fiddling with the Sprint Race format and for 2024, there will be changes as well that would see the "Sprint Saturday" concept being dropped.

In 2023 a Sprint weekend started with FP1 on Friday following by qualifying for Sunday's Grand Prix. Saturday was a Sprint affair with Sprint Qualifying and the Sprint held.

For this weekend in China, the format will be as follows: FP1 followed by Sprint qualifying on Friday, while Saturday action will start with the Sprint Race followed by qualifying for the Grand Prix on Sunday.

The teams are allowed to change their car setup after the Sprint Race and before the main qualifying which means their will effectively be two parc ferme's this weekend. One after FP1 and then after the main qualifying.

Speaking the the media at the Shanghai International Circuit, including GrandPrix247, Verstappen was asked to comment about the new Sprint format, he said: "I think it makes more sense.

"And for me, I think actually the most annoying bit about it before was that after FP1 you would go into qualifying and if you wouldn't, let's say nail the setup, you're stuck with it for the rest of the weekend, and that can really hurt your your weekend.

"And I think now, at least we have a few more opportunities to try and make it perfect. I think that's better for racing overall," he insisted.

Asked about the challenges of having the first Sprint weekend of 2024 at track where F1 last raced in 2019 with different cars, the Dutchman said: "I think with the new cars, that will be a little bit of an unknown.

"From the track side looks like they painted it not resurface," he pointed out, referring to the bitumen surface treatment the track was given, a commonly used process on roads in the United States and Asia.

The Red Bull ace added: "So I don't know what that does to the grip of the of the track, that is something that we have to get on top of, because it's same for everyone,

"But [we] just need to have a good FP1 hopefully, where we don't have to fine tune too much on on the car. That will really help we can hit the ground running," Verstappen concluded.