A Formula 1 race in Madrid is a step closer to reality after the boss of the proposed venue insisted that he knows when a deal will be signed.
The claim was made on Thursday the 13th by Jose Vicente de los Mozos, the president of the executive committee of the IFEMA fairgrounds and convention centre located to the northeast of the Spanish capital.
Opened in 1991 IFEMA has become a major centre for conferences and conventions, and there is enough land in and around it to form the basis of a race circuit, with the existing buildings called into use.
Since March it has been the host of the officially-sanctioned and well-received F1 Exhibition, which in effect has served to help the city to stake its claim for a race event.
Barcelona currently has a deal to run the Spanish GP until 2026, and it’s not clear yet if the plan is for the new event to eventually take over the title, or if it will run as the Madrid GP.
The Madrid area previously hosted F1 when the Spanish HP was held at Jarama, to the east of the city and not much further away from the centre than the new venue.
The track first held the race in 1968, initially alternating with Montjuich Park in Barcelona, which co-incidentally like the proposed new venue was a street track adjacent to an exhibition facility.
I know when we’re going to sign it and when we’re going to do it. We have followed the process indicated to us. The Spanish Automobile Federation has been informed from the first moment, we have signed exclusivity, and now we are advancing with the contract.
De Los Mozos on a future race deal.
It is true that Madrid wants to host a race in the future. And no decision has been taken so far. That’s another great sign of the state of the health of F1. And this is the right competition that will not involve at all any political discussion, only commercial and technical and sporting discussion we’ll be taking the next couple of months. And for the best of F1 we will take the right decision. I’m sure about it. But we need to remember that we still have years of contract with Barcelona, and we are really very, very happy with the way that Barcelona is handling the future because, of course, this has helped them to react, to push for the improvement that is needed at all levels, everywhere. And then this, of course, is in a moment where we have Fernando [Alonso] performing incredibly well, and we have Carlos Sainz in Ferrari. Both of them have a lot of fans. We see that the TV rating figure is growing incredibly well in Spain. So the market is very, very strong now. And so that’s great that we have these kinds of hopes for the future.
Stefano Domencali speaking to F1’s own Beyond the Grid podcast.
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