Due to an increasingly long calendar that has greatly tightened the agendas of the teams, the Monaco Grand Prix has been practically forced to modify its traditional and exclusive weekend format from 2022.
Historically, the event held on the streets of Monte Carlo has been an event that started on Thursday and ended on Sunday, unlike the rest of the Grands Prix, which have a total duration of three days, from Friday to Sunday.
This is due to the beginning of one of the most prestigious dates on the calendar. Given that the Monaco event was traditionally held the weekend after Ascension Day , a holiday that falls on a Thursday, contesting the first day (FP1 and FP2) on that day was the most logical thing to do.
However, over the years, this festival has not always been able to coincide with the race weekend, so maintaining the four-day format created more and more doubts, both on the part of the top leaders of the category as in the teams themselves.
After several negotiations with the organizers of the Monaco Grand Prix , Formula 1 confirmed at the end of last season that the Monte Carlo event would also be a three-day event, like the rest of the Grand Prix, starting Friday and ending Sunday. , eliminating the rest day between the first day of training and qualifying.
Why is FP1 and FP2 of the F1 Monaco GP moved to Friday?
First of all, this measure has been taken by Formula 1 for an obvious reason, by 2022, the top category calendar was scheduled to complete 23 grands prix (22 after the last cancellation without replacement of the Russian GP). This increase in the number of races, added to the new stricter cost limit and the complicated travel from one circuit to another, generated complaints among some teams, causing the reduction and simplification of some weekend formats and, that of Monaco , obviously, it was one of the main objectives.
On the other hand, the fact of playing free practice on Thursday, before opening the track to traffic on Friday morning, since the grand prix takes place in the streets of Monte Carlo , was not ideal either for the teams at the time to analyze data the rest of the weekend.
To a lesser extent, in recent years, the opening of the circuit to traffic on Fridays has been reduced, unlike the first editions of the Monaco GP, during recent seasons Formula 2 has rolled on the urban layout of Monte Carlo on the day Friday, so moving all the action from Thursday to Friday made perfect logistical and organizational sense in the world.
