The first day of the much-vaunted Las Vegas Grand Prix descended into chaos as practice was hit by problems with the new street track.
The first session was called off after just nine minutes of running when Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari hit a loose manhole cover, badly damaging his car.
Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur said the situation was “unacceptable”. The second session started two and a half hours late in front of almost empty stands after fan areas closed.
F1 said the decision, made at 01:30 local time, was caused by “logistical considerations for our fans and staff”. There was no mention of whether fans would receive refunds.
One difficulty for F1 is that most tickets sold were three-day packages so any single-day refunds would require a calculation as to how to split the value of each day.
Esteban Ocon’s Alpine was also damaged – like Sainz’s Ferrari, losing a chassis – after he hit the same manhole as Sainz on his return to the pits after the red flag.
The session finished at 04:00 local time and many drivers said they were struggling with adjusting to the timings of the race.
Despite that the majority of the drives do like the track, it begs the question of will we see this track on the F1 calendar for the fore sailable future after what went wrong today.
Formula 1 and Las Vegas Grand Prix organisers have agreed a deal with the city to shut the Strip on race weekends for the next 10 years.
