The 2025 Formula 1 season will start with the Australian Grand Prix, not Bahrain. However, it appears that the Middle Eastern kingdom may continue to organize winter testing and that it will not move to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in Spain.
The Bahrain Grand Prix has been the first race on the calendar since 2021, but the season-opening race on March 16 will be moved to Melbourne's Albert Park circuit. Due to Ramadan starting on March 1 next year, there will be no opportunity to race in the Middle East that month. It will be a busy start to the season in 2025, because just one week after Australia, the Formula 1 circus should be in China. After a week's break, we got a three-way match between Japan, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the race at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit was also postponed to April due to the month of Ramadan. The Miami Grand Prix remains the sixth round of the World Championship for Emilia-Romagna and Monaco, while Canada trails Spain to allow a triple-header in Europe. Moreover, the 2025 calendar remains the same compared to this year.
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Red Bull, VCARB and Kick Sauber against them
Before Bahrain became the season opener from 2021 to 2024, winter testing for the top flight was held in Spain – first at the Circuit de Jerez, the Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia, and at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, and only then on the latter track. With the Bahrain International Circuit being the first race of the year, moving winter testing to the Middle East from 2021 was also a logical move. Cars, cars and sports However, Bahrain will be allowed to keep their Test days despite losing their season opener.
Seven of the ten teams want to go to Bahrain, but Red Bull Racing, VCARB and Kick Sauber are said to prefer to do the testing days in Spain. It can be a bit cold in terms of temperature in February, but transporting all the cars and stuff to Barcelona-Catalunya via the motorway is easier and cheaper than transporting them to Bahrain by plane. Additionally, the Spanish track is very similar to the other circuits on the calendar. According to the German platform's calculations, each team will spend an additional 300,000 euros to test in Bahrain instead of Spain. Furthermore, it is also more sustainable to have to take less plane travel. However, the advantage of Bahrain is that there is a greater guarantee of warm and sunny weather.
At the next meeting of the F1 Commission, the teams will vote on their preferred location for the testing days from 26 to 28 February 2025, but Red Bull, VCARP and KIC Sauber do not currently have a majority in Barcelona-Catalunya.
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