The Las Vegas Grand Prix weekend started with a poor tone. After just 8 minutes into FP1, the entire session was canceled, due to a failure in drain covers. Naturally, this didn’t sit well with so many of the fans and teams, with many even going so far as to call it a black eye.

Over the last day, there have been many comments that have been thrown in support of the Las Vegas GP, including prominent voices like Mercedes Team Principal, Toto Wolff. He, along with Williams Boss James Vowles, asked for a little patience from the fans, and to wait till the race weekend ends before we judge it. However, drivers like Daniel Ricciardo, on the other hand, were not too impressed by the show so far.

Daniel Ricciardo Brings Up Safety Concerns

As a driver, putting their life at risk every time they get in an F1 car, safety is absolutely paramount. While there are undeniably a lot of risks that just can’t be mitigated, Daniel Ricciardo does believe that F1 can do a lot more to improve safety. Talking in criticism of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, he had the following to say.

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“Obviously two cars got ruined. And along with that, obviously there’s a financial thing there for the teams, which is a big issue for them. But you brought up the biggest thing, which is safety. Fortunately Carlos is okay, but those things could be greater. When I say ‘greater’, obviously ‘bigger’ and ‘bigger consequences’.” Later, he also implied that perhaps, Las Vegas had the show in mind over the driver’s safety.

The Honey Badger added, “I think it’s easy to say now ‘yeah, we did the opening ceremonies and we’re kind of focussed on other things’, but did they actually do their due diligence on the track? So with all that, what happened today, you could ask some questions, like, did they do enough? That one, for sure, I can’t sidestep that one – that is a safety concern. Us being here late, that’s fine, but I think the safety one is something hopefully they take pretty seriously.” 

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He also thought that this was the case in almost all the street circuits, and he speculated if it had something to do with the fact that it had to be opened for the public, especially over the weekend. As mentioned earlier, though, Thursday’s Free Practice Sessions did divide up the paddock with differing opinions. Toto Wolff championed in favor of the Sin City’s preparations for the weekend.

“We Shouldn’t be Moaning,” – Toto Wolff

Mercedes Team Boss, while understanding the safety concerns, did think that the issues were exaggerated. He felt that “this was nothing,” and instead of criticizing and complaining, we should be giving credit. “Give credit to the people that have set up this Grand Prix, that have made this sport much bigger than it ever was. Liberty has done an awesome job and just because in FP1 a drain cover has become undone, we shouldn’t be moaning.”

Williams Team-Prinicipal James Vowles followed suit. He summarized with a short, “Judge us by what happens when the chequered flag falls on Saturday, rather than what just happened in the last half an hour.”

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While it is true that the show that Vegas puts on was spectacular, these concerns should have been addressed well before the free practice underwent. Eventually, after Free Practice, they stopped the entire session, postponed and extended the next sessions, in order to address these concerns. Hopefully, such issues won’t be recurring, and spoil the Grand Prix.