F1 must make do with Montreal track facilities – promoter

The facilities at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve are good enough for formula one, according to race promoter Francois Dumonitier.

With 24 teams now squeezed into the modest Montreal pit building, it would be easy to negatively compare the Canadian venue with the likes of Shanghai, Istanbul and Abu Dhabi.

“It is this place that reminds me more than any other track on the F1 calendar of the look and feel of what it was like to go to Mosport to attend the first ever Canadian grand prix in 1967,” wrote New York Times correspondent Brad Spurgeon in 2008, F1’s most recent visit to Montreal.

But promoter Dumontier insists the world of F1 will need to make do.

“They need to put water in their wine,” he is quoted by French language RDS television.

“They are fortunate to go on tours where governments have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in facilities.  The essence is the race track and I think that our facilities are adequate,” Dumontier insists.

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