Formula 1: When is the 2020 season opener?

ByAsher Fair|
Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Formula 1 (Photo by Getty Images/Getty Images)
Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Formula 1 (Photo by Getty Images/Getty Images)

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the 2020 Formula 1 season opener has moved several times since the schedule was initially released.

Unfortunately, Formula 1, just like every other racing series and sporting league in the world, was unable to escape the effects of the coronavirus pandemic.

The 2020 season had not yet even gotten underway when the threat of COVID-19 began forcing races to be postponed or canceled.

The season was scheduled to get underway on Sunday, March 15 at Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit with the Australian Grand Prix.

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But that did not happen, even after all of the drivers and teams were at the track and ready to go.

What set off the chain of events that ultimately led to this cancellation was the fact that a McLaren team member tested positive for COVID-19, leading the Woking-based team to withdraw from the race.

Fortunately, this team member quickly recovered, and the 14 team members who were kept in Melbourne as a part of precautionary quarantine measures are safely back home now.

But this Australian Grand Prix cancellation was not the first. Formula 1 proceeded to call off the next three races on the schedule (although one of them had already been axed), making the scheduled season opener now the Dutch Grand Prix at Circuit Zandvoort on Sunday, May 3, but that race was then called off as well, as were the two right after it.

The season was then set to open on Sunday, June 7 with the Azerbaijan Grand Prix at Baku City Circuit, but race organizers opted to postpone the event indefinitely. The same happened with the Canadian Grand Prix at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve on Sunday, June 14, and the French Grand Prix at Circuit Paul Ricard, which scheduled to take place on Sunday, June 28, was canceled.

And that is how we got to this point in regard to actually getting the 2020 Formula 1 season underway:

Race # – Location – Grand Prix – Date 
1 – Melbourne – Australian – Sunday, March 15, 2020 
2 – Sakhir – Bahrain – Sunday, March 22, 2020 
3 – Hanoi – Vietnamese – Sunday, April 5, 2020 
4 – Shanghai – Chinese – Sunday, April 19, 2020 
5 – Zandvoort – Dutch – Sunday, May 3, 2020 
6 – Barcelona – Spanish – Sunday, May 10, 2020 
7 – Monte Carlo – Monaco – Sunday, May 24, 2020 
8 – Baku – Azerbaijan – Sunday, June 7, 2020 
9 – Montreal – Canadian – Sunday, June 14, 2020
10 – Le Castellet – French – Sunday, June 28, 2020
11 – Spielberg – Austrian – Sunday, July 5, 2020

As of now, the season is scheduled to get underway on Sunday, July 5 with what would have been the 11th race, the Austrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring.

The Formula 1 season has never begun this late in the sport’s history.

The latest it has ever begun was on Sunday, May 27 back in 1951 when the Grand Prix of Switzerland opened up the season at Bremgarten Circuit.

Hopefully the 2020 Formula 1 season does, in fact, get underway at the Red Bull Ring with the Austrian Grand Prix on Sunday, July 5 as planned. Check back in periodically with our tracker to see whether or not these plans remain the same.