Ferrari wish granted as Mugello to stage Scuderia's 1,000th GP in September

Ferrari is to celebrate its 1,000th Formula 1 grand prix on home soil as Mugello will stage a round of the championship in early September, GPFans has learned.

While a race at the Scuderia-owned track has been mooted for some time, sources have confirmed it will go ahead on September 11-13, a week after the Italian Grand Prix at Monza.

It means an extension to the European round of F1's heavily revised calendar that now sees nine races taking place in the opening 11 weeks, and includes a trio of triple headers.

Crucially, for Ferrari, it provides the team with a suitable platform on which to run its history-making race, even though like the other eight grands prix beforehand, there will be no fans.

Mugello, that has primarily been used for MotoGP over the years and is situated 20 miles north of Florence, becomes only the third circuit in Italy to stage a round of the F1 championship after Monza and Imola.

At this stage, it appears likely the Russian Grand Prix will retain its original September 25-27 slot, followed by a return to Portugal with the track at Portimao currently pencilled in for October 2-4.

The rounds in the Americas are proving the most problematic at this stage, particularly given the volatile nature of the Covid-19 outbreak in Texas and Brazil in particular, with numbers of infections continuing to rise.

Mexico has long been confident of staging its race on October 30-November 1, while China continues to push for staging an event, although the logistics for doing so are again troublesome.

What is near certain at this point is there will be a double-header in Bahrain in late November-early December, followed by either one or two races to conclude in Abu Dhabi.

Contractually, the Yas Marina circuit has to stage the season-ending event. The question over whether it hosts a single race or a double-header is dependent on the schedule post-Europe and pre-Middle East.

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