Up to 900 marshals are gearing up for Bahrain’s biggest motorsports event as they undergo drills and training to ensure a safe Grand Prix.
They are taking part in preparations that are underway at Bahrain International Circuit (BIC), which will host Formula One Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix 2020 from March 19 to 22.
At a drill that took place yesterday morning, Motorsports Marshal Club vice-president Ahmed Kuzbar told the GDN that hundreds of people are being trained in a number of roles such as recovery marshals who help in case of accidents, flag marshals who give signals to the drivers, as well as fire marshals who attend to vehicles in case of smoke or fire.
There is also a large medical team that will be present on site in case of accidents, along with management that oversee all the operations from the race control room, and a logistics team that provide support and equipment.
“Our training starts two months before the event, we do it every year because we have new marshals and old marshals, the new ones need training besides refreshing things for the old marshals as well,” said Mr Kuzbar.
“We use the circuit to do demo training for vehicle breakdowns and flags, as well as logistics who do a lot of training to see how long it would take them to serve the needs of the personnel.
“The number varies, we have between 750 and 900 marshals and this includes all office personnel, people on the track, logistics, fire, and recovery.”
The drill took place on the sidelines of the BIC 2,000cc Challenge and the Bahrain Motorcycle Racing (BMR) 600 races, where the marshals ran tests and inspections while race control was monitoring the entire event.
During yesterday’s drill, the GDN took a tour of the race control room where Mr Kuzbar explained the importance of watching over the entire operations in order to identify and react to the smallest possible incident, thanks to high definition cameras set up around the track.
“With these cameras we can see the smallest things on the track, because sometimes there will be debris, the bodies of F1 cars are made out of carbon fibre which is as sharp as a blade, so if a tyre runs over a piece of debris it will tear up the tyre,” he said.
“Any small debris that flies off can also hurt the driver behind the car, so when we get a call that there is any debris, we can zoom in and we know where it is and look at the distance between the cars and give a command to the marshals to go out, collect it and come back.”
At the 2018 Bahrain Grand Prix race, Ferrari mechanic Francesco Cigarini suffered a serious leg injury and later underwent successful surgery at the BDF Hospital.
During a pit stop, driver Kimi Raikkonen was given the signal to go before one of his rear tyres was replaced, causing the car to run over Mr Cigarini’s leg.
The Ferrari team was fined 50,000 euros and an investigation into the failure of the automated system was launched.
On the entrainment front at this year’s Grand Prix, two international DJs will take the stage; Afrojack will entertain fans on March 20 and Don Diablo will perform on March 21. BIC is also expected to announce another major international artist; the headline act for March 21.
All those with tickets to the four-day extravaganza will be able to attend the concerts.
Among the other attractions at BIC over the race weekend are carnival games, children’s play areas, stage acts and roaming acts such as renowned street performer Abraham Thill, a life-sized Toy Brigade, a hot air balloons travelling parade, Funky Style Band from Italy, Jam Batucada musical show from Spain and long-time favourites at BIC events – Dr Bubbles and Pop the Balloonman.
Attractions
In addition to Formula 1, there will be plenty of other racing action in the Bahrain Grand Prix with three highly competitive support series: The Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) Formula 2 Championship, the FIA Formula 3 Championship which will appear for the first time and the Porsche Sprint Challenge Middle East.
Formula 2 and Formula 3 will be holding their season-opening rounds in Bahrain in support of Formula 1.
Tickets for the Bahrain Grand Prix are available online at www.bahraingp.com, or via the BIC Hotline on 17450000, or at the BIC stand in City Centre Bahrain.
ghazi@gdn.com.bh
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