SPARKY on the BGP

By Nicholas Sparkes
January 1 2005

Nicholas Sparkes (a.k.a Sparky)brings you his views on the war over the British Grand Prix at Silverstone and the rest of the F1 calendar.

We keep on fighting

So the war is over. No, not Iraq, the saviour of the British Grand Prix. Finally it has been confirmed on the 2005 calendar with a new 5-year deal. The BRDC have had many sleepless nights over the future of the Silverstone racetrack, but on Thursday they and Ecclestone agreed that the race would go ahead. Great news for us, great news for all the local teams, even our Sports minister Richard Caborn who hasn’t really helped over the last few years is happy, so everyone’s a winner!

So what does this mean for our 2005 calendar? Well, we have 19 races to contend with, great news if you have a T.V Licence, bad news if you don’t. Nothing’s new with the season opener, as it’ll be kicking off in down-under Australia as usual. We will be making a visit to Turkey in August with the curtain closing in mid October in China. There are no less than five back-to-back race weekends, with July being the busiest month with four races. Once again it has been promised that it will be an unmissable season, with our only worry being relocating Sunday Lunch in front of the television.

Make sure these dates are in your diary!

March 6 AUSTRALIA Melbourne

March 20 MALAYSIA Sepang

April 3 BAHRAIN Sakhir

April 24 SAN MARINO Imola

May 8 SPAIN Barcelona

May 22 MONACO Monte Carlo

May 29 EUROPE Nurburgring

June 12 CANADA Montreal

June 19 USA Indianapolis

July 3 FRANCE Magny-Cours

July 10 BRITAIN Silverstone