Former F1 driver turned co-commentator and pundit Martin Brundle has doubled down on his support for sprint races, despite the continued protests of reigning world champion Max Verstappen. The Red Bull driver was extremely vocal about his distaste for the sport’s latest experiment throughout the 2023 season.
For the second season in succession, 2024’s calendar is home to six sprint race sessions with the experiment now into its fourth year after being introduced back in 2021. Over that period, significant changes have been made to the points offered by the races, as well as their placement among and effect on the rest of the race weekend.
Despite these changes – many of which have been well received – the debate regarding the future of sprint races remains a contentious one. Verstappen, for his part, has been keen to make his opposition known at every possible avenue, while Brundle has been a strong supporter.
“Whenever we change it next, it needs to be for good. We can’t keep messing around,” Brundle told Sky Sports. “I don’t like to see so much trial and error going on in F1. I stand by my comment that the worst sprint race is still significantly better than the best FP2 session that it replaces effectively.
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“I think F1 has to stay away from stuff like success ballast or that kind of penalty. I think F1 is about excellence, not some kind of pull the grid out of a hat, lucky dip kind of thing.”
Brundle then discussed the idea of reverse-grid sprint races, explaining: “With the way F1 is, if you reverse some of the grids, the teams will immediately start working out how fast or slow they need to go.
“What I don’t like is the disconnect between Friday’s main race qualifying and then [on] Sunday I find myself having to think about it all weekend and try to explain it to everybody that doesn’t work.”
Outlining his main complaints after his triumph in the United States Grand Prix sprint last season, Verstappen explained: “If you want my honest opinion about sprint weekends, I don’t really get excited by it.
“I just feel like once you complete [Friday] qualifying you are a bit lost. I feel like we only need one qualifying in the weekend where you really put everything on the line and it feels great.
“This morning as well, I put it on P1 and was like ‘Pfft it’s a Saturday, there’s not many points anyway for the race’. And besides that like now we’ve done this race everyone more or less knows what’s going to happen tomorrow between all the cars in terms of pace, so it takes away a bit the excitement of it.”
