Formula One has confirmed the season-opening Australian Grand Prix is off.

The official verdict arrived just after 10am local time in Melbourne following almost 12 hours of confusion sparked by McLaren’s withdrawal in the wake of a staff member testing positive for coronavirus.

F1 bosses have since discussed suspending the start of the new season until June.

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The sport’s traditional curtain raiser at Melbourne’s Albert Park was officially axed just 90 minutes before practice was due to begin on Friday.

The statement from F1’s governing body, the FIA read: “Following the confirmation that a member of the McLaren Racing Team has tested positive for COVID-19 and the team’s decision to withdraw from the Australian Grand Prix, the FIA and Formula 1 convened a meeting of the other nine team principals on Thursday evening.

“Those discussions concluded with a majority view of the teams that the race should not go ahead. The FIA and Formula One, with the full support of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation (AGPC) have therefore taken the decision that all Formula One activity for the Australian Grand Prix is cancelled.”

Sources indicated to the PA news agency in the early hours of Friday that the race would be scrapped. But the failure by F1’s American owners’ Liberty Media and the FIA to act quickly resulted in thousands of fans arriving at the Albert Park venue for practice.

The chairman of the Australian Grand Prix corporation even told local breakfast television that the race would go ahead as planned.

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Just moments before F1 – who will now face strong criticism for their handling of the eventual cancellation – confirmed the race would no longer go ahead, Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes team revealed they had written a letter to the sport’s bosses requesting for the race to be scrapped.

The Chinese Grand Prix, scheduled to take place in Shanghai on April 19, has been postponed due to the coronavirus, with the first case identified in Wuhan last December.

And more races could follow.

Although next weekend’s behind-closed-doors race in Bahrain is yet to be formally called off, it is understood that the view of the sport’s travelling circus is to delay the campaign until the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, pencilled in for June 7, at the earliest.

As it stands, the season is due to end in Abu Dhabi on November 29, but it is understood the race could be pushed back until December to allow room for next month’s postponed Chinese Grand Prix and the inaugural race in Vietnam, currently pencilled in for April 5, to be squeezed back into a rejigged calendar.

The Dutch Grand Prix, the first in Holland for 36 years, is due to take place on May 3, but that might now be moved to August, with the sport’s customary summer break scrapped. Eighteen races may be staged in six months.

The historic Monaco Grand Prix, set for May 24, could become the sport’s biggest casualty, while there may also be no room for the races in Bahrain and Spain.

There are no plans for the Australian GP to be rescheduled for later in the year.

“The scale of this is massive,” said F1 motorsport boss Ross Brawn. “We want to try and build the Formula One season back up, but we have to be realistic when that can start again.

“The teams survive on their funding from races. Each race you lose, it has an impact.

“There is a strong resilience in Formula One and we have got plans to rebuild the season and try to accommodate as many of the lost races.

“People need to show tolerance in terms of how we build the rest of the year, and the teams are in the right place to understand this necessity.”

Source: TalkSport.com Motorsport