Former F1 team boss Giancarlo Minardi believes the fans who attended Silverstone got their money's worth because of the new sprint format. The British Grand Prix saw F1 introduce a new concept with qualifying taking place on Friday evening, a 100km sprint race on Saturday and the race itself on Sunday. Minardi feels the fans were given a great spectacle as a result of the changed qualifying format. "We saw a huge crowd at the F1 race at Silverstone and I'm sure they enjoyed it," Minardi told RacingNews365. "I mean they got their money's worth and saw no less than three days of spectacle." Lewis Hamilton was fastest on Friday during qualifying but did not take pole position since Max Verstappen won the sprint race to start from first place on Sunday. This is something Minardi thinks F1 should change. "I still think it is a shame that Hamilton was not assigned a pole position," said Minardi. "I find that incomprehensible. I mean, he was the fastest over one lap on Friday, left Verstappen far behind and he still got nothing for it. "That is a point that should be looked at closely in my opinion. In my experience it cannot be the case that whoever wins sprint qualifying can claim pole position, because pole counts for the fastest over a lap and not for the one who manages to win a short race. Article continues below image
"That's how it has always been in Formula 1 and that's how it should remain, it's one of the defining parts of the sport. "Those are the changes that one has to look at. The idea of changing the F1 weekend can certainly get used to, because as I said, the fans on the track were the winner of the new format. "So I hope people will look closely at how to perfect this new set-up, because that's necessary in my opinion. It's not quite perfect yet and there will certainly be people who know more about it than me, who will still be able to optimise the new set-up in the future." The top three finishers of the sprint race received points with three points for the pole sitter. This will be the case at the remaining two sprint events at Monza and either USA or Brazil. Minardi would like to see points given to the top 10 finishers of the sprint race. "Besides the fact that pole should go to the fastest driver over one lap, I also think that more drivers should finish in the points during the sprint qualifying," continued Minardi. "It is a short race and so more drivers should be rewarded for their performance. "Therefore, just like in the race, the first ten drivers get points. That gives the drivers even more motivation to do as well as possible in the sprint qualifying."
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