F1 teams likely to field race drivers for FP1 sessions next season

FP1 will have a major say on the race results from 2014

Formula One teams are likely to field their race drivers for the FP1 sessions in 2014 after it was decided that the sessions will be set to last for two hours rather than the current 90 minutes.

Mercedes team principal Ross Brown said that it will be an opportunity for the drivers to get some extra running.

“I think for us we’ll still stick with race drivers. One of the main changes is an extra set of tyres for the first half hour, which I think is a good move, and the ability to change drivers during a session, which is actually not easy.”

“If you’ve got drivers with too much variance then it’s not such an easy thing but it’s doable. But it’s not something that we would be considering because we need all the time in the car with our two race drivers – all the time we can get in the car with them,” he said.

Meanwhile, McLaren team Principal Martin Whitmarsh said that the front-running teams could exploit the decision unless the rules are strict enough.

“I think from McLaren’s perspective it’s not something that we’d necessarily want to do. I can understand the view of some – which is that it’s very difficult for young drivers, there’s very little testing and it’s a way of encouraging them – but oddly I think it will work against the smaller teams because at the moment they have a unique opportunity to sell FP1; many do and it’s a surprisingly important revenue for some of those teams,” he said.