OCTOBER 2, 2016

Current 21-race calendar too much says Alonso

Fernando Alonso thinks the current F1 calendar is at the limit.

There are 21 races this year and there will be 21 again in 2017, but beyond that, the sport's new owner Liberty Media has talked about expanding the calendar to as many as 25 dates.

"I understand and I respect the reasons for wanting to expand further," McLaren-Honda driver Alonso is quoted by Speed Week.

"When I started in F1, we had 16 or 17 grands prix but a lot of testing between the race weekends -- we were about as busy as we are today and perhaps even more.

"But the big point is that we travel too much and have too many races back-to-back," he added.

Alonso said the biggest problem with the 21-race calendar is how the races are organised.

"We rush from Europe in early September to Singapore and now we're in Malaysia," he said at Sepang. "In just a few days we will meet again in Japan and then we go off to the other side of the world again.

"And then we're back across the Atlantic to Abu Dhabi. To me, it's just too much," Alonso insisted.

(GMM)