Start, Istanbul Park, 2020

F1 confirms return to Istanbul in place of cancelled Singapore GP

2021 F1 season

Posted on

| Written by

Formula 1 will return to Istanbul Park in Turkey for the 16th round of the world championship in October, the championship as announced.

The Turkish Grand Prix will take the place of Singapore’s round of the world championship on the 2021 F1 calendar. The Singapore street race was cancelled three weeks ago, for the second year running.

The race will take place on October 3rd, six weeks earlier than the series’ visit to the track last season.

A race in Turkey was previously announced in place of the cancelled Canadian Grand Prix earlier this month. However that was called off when the British government added the country to its “red list”, requiring anyone who returns from there to quarantine for 10 days.

F1 expects it will be able to fully comply with the travel restrictions which are likely to be in place in just over three months’ time. Discussions have been held over accommodating the onward travel of teams’ staff to the next round of the world championship in Japan, which will be held the following week.

Formula 1’s president and CEO Stefano Domenicali said: “We hope to see another fantastic race again in one of the best tracks in the world.

“We want to thank the Intercity Istanbul Park management and Mr Vural Ak for his personal efforts to make this event to happen. We have shown that we can continue to adapt and there is huge interest in our sport and the hope from many locations to have a grand prix. We have had very good conversations with all the other promoters since the start of the year and continue to work closely with them during this period.”

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

Updated 2021 F1 calendar

RoundRaceCircuitDate
1Bahrain Grand PrixBahrain International CircuitMar 26-28
2Emilia-Romagna Grand PrixImolaApr 16-18
3Portuguese Grand PrixAutodromo do AlgarveApr 30-May 2
4Spanish Grand PrixCircuit de CatalunyaMay 7-9
5Monaco Grand PrixMonacoMay 20-23
6Azerbaijan Grand PrixBaku City CircuitJun 4-6
7French Grand PrixPaul RicardJun 18-20
8Styrian Grand PrixRed Bull RingJun 25-27
9Austrian Grand PrixRed Bull RingJul 2-4
10British Grand PrixSilverstoneJul 16-18
11Hungarian Grand PrixHungaroringJul 30-Aug 1
12Belgian Grand PrixSpa-FrancorchampsAug 27-29
13Dutch Grand PrixZandvoortSep 3-5
14Italian Grand PrixMonzaSep 10-12
15Russian Grand PrixSochi AutodromSep 24-26
16Turkish Grand PrixIstanbul ParkOct 1-3
17Japanese Grand PrixSuzukaOct 8-10
18United States Grand PrixCircuit of the AmericasOct 22-24
19Mexico City Grand PrixAutodromo Hermanos RodriguezOct 29-31
20Sao Paulo Grand PrixInterlagosNov 5-7
21Australian Grand PrixAlbert ParkNov 19-21
22Saudi Arabian Grand PrixJeddah Street CircuitDec 3-5
23Abu Dhabi Grand PrixYas MarinaDec 10-12

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

2021 F1 season

Browse all 2021 F1 season articles

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

15 comments on “F1 confirms return to Istanbul in place of cancelled Singapore GP”

    1. They haven’t changedd Melbourne either in the preview build that F1 YouTubers played.

  1. Except the Japanese GP will likely face cancellation for severe entry restrictions like last year (MotoGP’s Motegi event cancellation effectively confirmed this), so the weekend after will eventually become empty, meaning the red list thing would be an issue again.

    1. Brazillian GP might also get axed along with Japanese GP. Not sure about what situation in Mexico is like right now(had few friends go there for herping recently and havent heard back from them since they returned).

      1. @Chaitanya Brazil will definitely get axed. So will, with all likelihood Australia for the same reason as Japan.

        1. +1 there’s no way at all that Australia,Japan or Brazil go ahead. As others have said Mexico is maybe a 50/50. Depending on how the Delta variant impacts other countries I wouldn’t rule out more races being cancelled too. In the uk cases have gone up to over 10k per day from 1-2k per day in only a week and that’s with impressive vaccine numbers.

          1. No way Mexico will happen this year. Same for Brazil and Australia

  2. Barry Bens (@barryfromdownunder)
    25th June 2021, 10:11

    Now to hope the owners ensure we don’t get a repeat of the farce of last year with the terrible grip levels

    1. Well, I doubt they will resurface the track again this summer @barryfromdownunder! Surely a year having passed, and more support races, will help improve that tarmac. Also, it could be dry.

      1. RandomMallard (@)
        25th June 2021, 11:30

        Aaahhh reply not report sorry

        @bascb Istanbul Park hosts very few races nowadays and is pretty much abandoned before F1 returned last year, so the grip probably won’t have improved too much.

        1. I think there will be some change from the winter rains, a bit of a dry spell over the summer etc, that will get a lot of the oily stuff out already.

          And it seems F1 might actually have a few support races to help clean up the track this year.

          So it will definitely be somewhat better. But I doubt the track saw more than a few cars in the interim period since last race, yeah. Not just there is little racing there in a normal year, but the whole epidemic surely hasn’t helped getting cars racing on tracks either!

    2. Last year Istanbul was being truly enjoyable, until it (mostly) dried up at it was all previsible and boring again

  3. One of the best racing tracks!

    1. I’d rather have Singapore, very long race but at some point something always happens there.

  4. Wohoooo TURN 8 monster speed about time!!!

Comments are closed.