It is official now. Bernie has spoken: A contract has been signed to hold a street circuit race in Baku. AND South Korea will not come back onto the 2015 calendar. Their time is up. SPEEDWEEK Formel 1 - Aserbeidschan-GP kommt für Südkorea, nicht Sotschi So Sotchi is not (yet) getting axed for this new track. Whether it will happen remains to be seen given the political situation. The F1 teams are already complaining about the difficulties of dealing with the logistics getting equipment past the Russian border.
What an exotic location. I couldn't be more excited. I'm so happy I could lay down and do nothing. :|
Yes but that is neither Baku's nor Bernie's fault. That's down to the French society and it's government lacking any interest in F1. THAT is ridiculous.
If all those (not only Bernie) involved in F1 were not so greedy, setting a GP would not be a rip-off, but that´s another story. If someone at Azerbaijan is willing to pay for a GP, then so be it.
Baku used to be called the Paris of the East, wasn't? Maybe more than one city claimed that, but that just tells that is a beautiful destination. Being a street circuit, it could done a la Monaco. Not sure if this will become a trend to make for a race quick, but much better than what Korea offered.
Baku looks very pretty. Look at pictures on google...I hope it'll be a night race (it probably will be). Couldn't say the same of the farmland of South Korea.
It can be pretty, but there are no crowds. It really is too bad that there can't be more races in Europe, or South America... even in Africa...
Agreed. Argentina is working on a comeback though and Mexico looks like it is going to happen. Africa is really the white patch on the global map
I was in Buenos Aires when the last one was supposed to happen and was heart broken when they cancelled it. Would definitely travel there again if this GP came back
Argentina would be great, for sure. Mexico will, too. I could even see a race happen in the caribbean... South Africa could possibly work, too. Is Kyalami still around? Portugal could definitely host a race again, they have some top notch tracks such as Portimão.
Buenos Aires is one of the coolest towns on the planet and their culture is superb. You don't really need a reason. That said the GP would be quite away from the town in a new to develop region.
Sadly, lately, not as nice. They are not in a great economic state, unfortunately. Still worth a visit, though.
Red Bull is getting the word out: DC did some demonstrations drive in Almaty. SPEEDWEEK Formel 1 - David Coulthard: Demofahrt in Kasachstan
Poor South Korea. How many millions were lost (and placed in Bernie's pockets) on that silly project? -F
The bigger issue there is that they never built the city around the track as they planned. That's what must really hurt them
