F1 sprint is set for its biggest ever season this year with six sprint races on the calendar for 2023 - doubling the amount from 2022 and 2021. The 100km Saturday dash, first introduced at the British Grand Prix in 2021, has proven popular with teams and fans alike and will be present at more than a quarter of Grand Prix weekends during the 23-race season. Why F1’s sprint shake-up could be the beginning of the end for Max Verstappen There was an unanimous agreement to increase the number of sprint events amongst F1 teams at a meeting of the F1 commission meeting last year, following discussions with the FIA and a vote amongst the World Motor Sport Council (WMSC). As it was last year, the F1 sprint is a 100km race with no mandatory pit stops and drivers racing flat-out to the chequered flag. As it was in the 2022 season, the top eight drivers score points, with the driver who finishes P1 receiving eight points. How does the sprint race work? The F1 Commission and the FIA have approved new sprint weekend format changes which will see an extra qualifying session added to the schedule. The new order of play sees a new ‘sprint shootout’ take place on Saturday morning instead of a second practice session, with traditional qualifying on Friday now setting the grid for Sunday’s grand prix. It means there will be just one practice session over the course of the weekend, while Saturday is designated ‘sprint day’. The result of the Saturday sprint – a 100km dash, roughly a third of the distance of the grand prix – will not impact the grid for Sunday, as opposed to the past two years. Points will be awarded to the top-eight, as was the case in 2022. But now, that Friday qualifying session will take on added weight as it will set the grid for Sunday’s grand prix, regardless of what happens in Saturday’s sprint race. On Saturday, instead of what was seen as a generally pointless second practice session on Saturday, a new ‘sprint shootout’ will take place to form the starting grid for the sprint race later in the day. It will follow the same Q1-Q2-Q3 format but the session times will be shorter than traditional qualifying: Q1 will be 12 minutes, Q2 will be 10 minutes and Q3 will be eight minutes. NEW SPRINT WEEKEND FORMAT Friday: Free Practice 1; qualifying (for Sunday’s Grand Prix) Saturday: Sprint qualifying; sprint race (Top-eight receive points, finish order will have no impact on Grand Prix grid) Sunday: Grand Prix How many points are on offer? P1 - Eight points P2 - Seven points P3 - Six points P4 - Five points P5 - four points P6 - three points P7 - two points P8 - one point Where will the sprint races take place this season? There will be six sprint races this season, including at three of the final six Grand Prix weekends. ROUND 4 - AZERBAIJAN Baku City Circuit - 28-30 April Sprint shootout pole: Charles Leclerc Sprint race winner: Sergio Perez ROUND 10 - AUSTRIA Red Bull Ring, Spielberg - 30 June-2 July ROUND 13 - BELGIUM Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps - 28-30 July ROUND 18 - QATAR Lusail International Circuit, Lusail - 6-8 October ROUND 19 - UNITED STATES Circuit of the Americas, Austin - 20-22 October ROUND 21 - BRAZIL Interlagos Circuit, Sao Paulo - 3-5 November Read More F1 race schedule: What time is the Austrian Grand Prix on Sunday? Why have Wrexham owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney invested in Alpine F1 team? F1’s sprint shake-up could be the beginning of the end for Max Verstappen ‘Happy’ Lewis Hamilton still hungry for record eighth world title – Damon Hill F1 2023 calendar: All 23 Grand Prix this year Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney to invest in F1 team

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It’s the rubber match between the Seattle Mariners and LA Angels in Anaheim and it’s an important one as they battle to be the third team in a top heavy AL West. Seattle evened the series with a 6-2 win yesterday to get to 31-32 and the Angels are 35-32, third in the division.For the...

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Despite being a Manchester City fan so committed to the club that she had pet goldfish named Shaun Goater and Nicolas Anelka as a child, Keira Walsh was also a keen student of “tiki-taka”-era Barcelona growing up in Rochdale, admiring the total control demonstrated by Pep Guardiola’s sides through elegant possession football. These days, Pep is managing City and it is Walsh herself sitting at the heart of Barca’s midfield. She made that move last summer for a world record fee after starring for the Lionesses at Euro 2022, pulling the strings at the centre of the park like another of her idols, David Silva, always knowing precisely when to play the killer pass. There was no finer example of this than the perfectly-weighted long ball she dinked into Ella Toone for England’s opener against Germany in the final, for which she was deservingly named player of the match. Another famed instance of Walsh’s artistry in action came at the SheBelieves Cup in Japan in 2019, when she played in Beth Mead with a pass that took out no fewer than eight separate opposition players in one move, a clip of which swiftly went viral. Her performances during the Euros inspired French journalist Julien Laurens to hail her as “the best player in the world”, an accolade that will place renewed pressure on her to stamp her authority on the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand this summer. However, a nasty-looking injury sustained in England’s second group game against Denmark saw her carried from the field on a stretcher, potentially bringing her tournament to a premature end. Walsh, now 26, abandoned youthful passions for badminton and cricket to commit to football, emerging from Blackburn Rovers’ youth system before transferring to her beloved City in 2014, where she made 118 appearances and became known to the club’s Oasis-besotted fans as “WonderWalsh” in tribute to her dependable presence. Former teammate Jill Scott, incidentally, has said her nickname among the Lionesses is “Sat Nav Foot” for the extraordinary precision of her passing. For England, Walsh has effortlessly succeeded Fara Williams in central midfield, having been handed the captain’s armband in just her seventh outing for the Lionesses, aged 21, and is no doubt the first name on Sarina Wiegman’s team sheet these days. Read More How to watch England vs Nigeria: TV channel and start time for Women’s World Cup fixture Who do England women play next? World Cup fixtures and route to the final Women’s football world rankings: Who could take No 1 at the World Cup?

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