F1 announces six sprint races venues for 2025

Red Bull's Max Verstappen has won all three sprint races that have taken place so far in the 2024 season

Formula 1 has announced the six grands prix which will host events in the sprint format in 2025.

The races, which feature a shorter race on the Saturday before the main event on the Sunday, start with the second grand prix of the season in China on 21-23 March.

The others are Miami on 2-4 May, Belgium on 25-27 July, the US Grand Prix in Austin on 17-19 October, Brazil on 7-9 November and the penultimate race in Qatar on 28-30 November.

China, Miami, Austin, Brazil and Qatar are also sprint events on this year’s schedule.

Belgium hosted a sprint previously in 2023.

The 2025 F1 season starts in Australia on 14-16 March.

F1 has also released data to demonstrate that audiences are higher for sprint events than for grands prix run to the standard format, which sees two practice sessions on Friday, followed by one on Saturday before qualifying and then the race.

A statement said that live audience figures for the sprint in qualifying and sprint in China this year were 40% higher across F1’s top 15 markets compared to the average practice sessions for the opening two races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

F1 chairman Stefano Domenicali said: “The sprint has been a great success for Formula 1, bringing all our fans more action and racing on the track.

“We are seeing the proof of this in our audience data, fan attendance on Fridays and from the promoters and partners.”

F1 will mark the 75th anniversary of the founding of the world championship next season and Domenicali said the sprint was “a great example of bringing new elements to our sport in a way that is respectful of the championship”.

There will be no changes next year to the new sprint format that was introduced this season.

F1 bosses discussed making further modifications to the format earlier this year. Those talks will be revisited at a later date but there is no indication of timing or specific changes that might be considered.

The new format this year separated out the sprint from the main grand prix.

There had been a number of different formats before this season, but all mixed together the sprint and grand prix in one way or another - either by having the sprint set the grid for the main race or by having the sprint in between grand prix qualifying and the race itself.

Under the latest format introduced in 2024, a qualifying session that sets the grid for the sprint takes place on Friday afternoon, followed by the sprint as the first track event for F1 on Saturday.

The qualifying session for the main grand prix is run later on Saturday before the grand prix on Sunday.