Raikkonen wants condensed weekends from 2020

Kimi Raikkonen reckons Formula 1 shouldn’t wait until 2021 to introduce a condensed schedule as he feels Thursdays are a waste of time.

Announcing the new-for-2021 regulations, the FIA confirmed a shortened race weekend, doing away with the Thursdays.

Instead media briefings and scrutineering will take place on a Friday morning with FP1 and FP2 pushed back to later in the day.

Raikkonen doesn’t want F1 to wait until 2021.

“It should’ve happened next year, I mean today (Thursday) is absolutely useless for us,” he said.

“I think it will be a good step because people don’t need to be away that many days because they spend months outside.

“So, it will be better for the teams. Stop wasting time.”

Toro Rosso’s Pierre Gasly agrees.

“I think everyone is happy about it because more days at home, more days with the family,” he said.

“Not so much for us because I would say, we almost have the easiest life in the paddock but for all the guys, the mechanics, engineers, you can see by talking to them that to have a personal life in that world, working in that environment is really difficult I think it is a good thing.”

However the FIA’s announcement also came with news that the powers-that-be had agreed that the calendar could be increased to as many as 25 races.

Carlos Sainz added: “It still involves too much travelling, effort for mechanics.

“But I think this is a way of preparing for a bigger calendar, which is something I totally against.

“Twenty-one or 22 races already feels too much.

“So, that last extra day that we take off, that will fully compensate those 22 or 25 races that we want to have in the future.”

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