The Japanese Super Formula Championship has revealed a reconfigured calendar for the 2020 season.
The rejigged schedule will see all seven rounds crammed into the final four months of the year.
Following many questions and numerous delays, a new provisional calendar for the 2020 Super Formula season has been released.
The provision schedule is as follows, although Super Formula have been keen to emphasise that this could still change at short notice:
Round 1: Motegi (August 30th)
Round 2: Okayama (September 27th)
Round 3: Sugo (October 18th)
Round 4: Autopolis (November 15th)
Round 5: Suzuka (December 5th)
Round 6: Suzuka (December 6th)
Round 7: Fuji (December 20th)
Although not confirmed as of yet, the series is looking to hold two days of testing just prior to the opener at Motegi, possibly over August 27th and 28th. In this instance, practice for Motegi may still run on Saturday (29th), with qualifying moving to raceday morning and a race of between 160-190km to be run that Sunday.
For the Suzuka pair, extensive practice may run on the Friday of the race weekend, with qualifying for both rounds being held on Saturday and Sunday morning’s, followed by races for rounds five and six later on those days.
The December 20th finale at Fuji Speedway will prove to be the latest Super Formula has ever completed a season.
The calendar is no doubt proved tricky to organise. While Super Formula may only contain seven race weekends, due to the high number of competitors who also compete in Super GT, it was necessary to balance calendars against each other to ensure neither championship clash.
There may still be changes to the driver line-up for Super Formula due to current quarantine restrictions in place in Japan that are not due to lifted for some time yet. As it stands, both reigning champion Nick Cassidy and Super Formula rookie Sacha Fenestraz are based in Tokyo and will not be required to quarantine.
However, both Jüri Vips and Tatiana Calderon are based in Estonia and Spain respectively and it is therefore unclear as to whether they will be allowed to compete – at this point, they may miss rounds of the championship, unless Japan softens its stance.
TheMotorsportArchive.com has reached out to Sergio Sette Camara and Charles Milesi, but has not had confirmation from either party as of yet.
Japan’s quarantine rules do contain quarantine exemptions for exceptional circumstances, but as yet, this does not include sporting exemptions.
*Update (June 18th, 2020)
B-Max by Motopark racer Charles Milesi confirmed today that while he tested at Fuji earlier in the year, he is not based in Japan and is currently based in France. According to the 19-year-old Milesi, he acknowledged that “For us the situation is not really clear for the moment, we don’t really know how the situation will be in August but the Japanese embassy told us that they will have more information about that end of June.”
