Haas F1 Team Principal Guenther Steiner has praised the impromptu two-day weekend that occurred last time out at the Eifel Grand Prix after poor weather on Friday led to the cancellation of two practice sessions.
Teams entered Saturday with just one hour of practice before qualifying got underway, with the race occurring as usual on Sunday.
Later this season, in a planned move due to travel distances, a two-day weekend featuring a sole 90-minute practice session will be held at Imola ahead of qualifying and the grand prix.
Steiner says that having shorter weekends will allow for more races during a year, but conceded there are downsides to the idea.
“In my own opinion, a two-day event works well,” Steiner said. “It allows us to get more races in, which in turn means more fans around the world could get the chance to see us.
“The cons, which I don’t know if they’re cons – that’s for Formula 1 to look into it, it’s for the promoters, as a Friday gives more possibilities to get fans in. Financially it’s a good day for them.
“I don’t know all these things as I’m not involved in them, but on the sheer practical side of going racing, I have nothing against two-day events.
“Maybe some events we go to we could put on a Thursday and Friday test – we can make something out like we do with pre-season testing and the broadcasting of that.
“These are just ideas, I don’t know if they make sense but maybe we should look into that.”
Speaking about the challenges of running with zero data from Friday, Steiner likened it to the “old days”, with bold decisions being made during important sessions.
“The biggest challenge was to wait out Friday not knowing what to do,” Steiner said. “That was – I wouldn’t say challenging, but it was boring, and not well invested time.
“I think we adapted well, and it’s more like the old days of racing – you have to be a lot quicker in thinking what to do and making bolder decisions, hoping you don’t get them wrong.
“You don’t have that much time to look at data, you need to go a little bit by the seat of your pants. I think our guys did a good job on that one.”
