NOVEMBER 20, 2002

More talking Turkey

The Turks have been doing a lot of talking in recent months about hosting a Grand Prix at some point in the future and now that the national election is out of the way the Turks are again pushing for an F1 date. Bernie Ecclestone visited a number of sites in the country recently and the Turks are now aiming to fill one of the two slots in the F1 caledar which become available in 2005. The recent announcement of a race in Bahrain was thought to have been a serious blow to Turkey as the F1 circus does not need too many races in the region. Turkey is also bidding to join the European Union and with the EU becoming increasingly difficult over the issue of tobacco advertising this could work against the Turks.

Turkey says it has the land available for a race track and is now planning to start a design study for the race track. This is expected to be on the eastern side of Istanbul.