WorldSBK aiming to complete season with six or seven rounds in 2020
While Dorna has been in regular communication about how it intends to get the much delayed 2020 MotoGP World Championship season underway, less is known about how it plans to restart the sister 2020 WorldSBK Championship
Unlike MotoGP, the WorldSBK did kick off earlier this year with a round at Phillip Island but has been beset by a number of postponements and cancellations since. As it stands, Donington Park on July 3-5 is listed as the provisional second event of the year, but it is unclear whether it will still be able to go ahead.
Dorna has now provided some detail over how it intends to carry out the remainder of the 2020 WorldSBK season, targeting just six or seven more rounds most likely focused around the MotoGP calendar with events happening a week after the premier series.
The thinking behind this revolves around the strict measures Dorna will need to enforce in terms of paddock safety, making it more logical for WorldSBK to follow on from MotoGP at the same venues with the infrastructure already in place.
“Many of the circuits we’ll go to will organise one or two races of MotoGP and then one round of WorldSBK,” Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta said in a roundtable. “We are managing that. There are some circuits that don’t host both but of course, our priority is to have WorldSBK and for sure, to have a minimum number of rounds.”
“In WorldSBK, we already have one round in Australia, and then we are looking to have minimum of six to seven more. This is what we are considering but it also depends on the situation, because the medical protocols must be the same as MotoGP more or less.
“We are studying together with WorldSBK what the best calendar is. But of course, we will try; it’s a priority for us also to have WorldSBK races.”
What this means for the WorldSBK calendar remains to be seen, but it is believed Dorna could focus the season initially around the Iberian Peninsula in order to limit cross-national movement. This would involve races at Jerez, Aragon and the Circuit de Catalunya, the latter of which was due to make its debut on the calendar in 2020. Portimao in neighbouring Portugal could also be included.
Beyond that, Dorna is confident of its MotoGP events taking place at the Red Bull Ring and Brno, meaning they could now also feature on a revised WorldSBK schedule.
As for the remaining rounds, Donington Park – with UK not part of the Schengen zone – looks under threat, while Magny-Cours in France is in jeopardy because of the nation’s strict mass gathering restrictions which have already caused the French F1 Grand Prix to be cancelled.
Finally, the two flyaway rounds towards the end of the year in Argentina and Qatar remain question marks due to the logistical issues of entering both people and freight into the country in a timely manner.
