World champion Lando Norris has warned that the upcoming Monaco Grand Prix will present a significantly steeper challenge for Formula 1 drivers next year, primarily because the race weekend will now incorporate the Sprint race format. The 2027 F1 calendar, which was unveiled on Wednesday, expands the number of Sprint weekends to ten – four more than the current season – and marks the first time that the iconic Principality’s narrow, winding street circuit will host a Sprint event. Monaco has long been famed for its tight, twisty layout that leaves very little room for overtaking. Historically, the Sprint format has been employed on circuits where passing is more feasible, but Monaco’s unique characteristics make qualifying already one of the most demanding tasks a driver can face.
Adding a Sprint race on top of the usual qualifying session therefore raises the stakes dramatically. Speaking to Sky Sports F1’s Natalie Pinkham alongside golfer Justin Rose during a media appearance at the BMW PGA Championship Pro‑Am at Wentworth, the McLaren driver explained his thoughts. “Interesting,” Norris began, before elaborating: “The main thing is that now you’ve got a free‑practice session on Friday, then Sprint qualifying on the same day – that’s the new challenge. Normally you have three full practice sessions spread over the weekend, but now you’re forced to condense all the setup work and track familiarisation into just 60 minutes.” He continued, “On a normal weekend you get three one‑hour practice slots to build a rhythm on this twisty, wall‑lined circuit where any mistake is heavily punished.
With the Sprint format, you lose that luxury. You have to extract all the data you need in a single session, which has probably never happened before at Monaco.” Norris highlighted how the compressed schedule will affect driver preparation.
“It means we’ll have to rely a lot more on the data we collected this year,” he said. “It’s obviously tougher for us as drivers because we don’t have as much time to get comfortable with the car and the track. You’ll probably have to take a bit more risk earlier in the weekend, when the field is still figuring things out.
Normally you can sit back, fine‑tune your setup and be at 99 % confidence, but in Monaco you can’t push beyond that limit – go to 103 or 104 % and it’s game over.” The British driver added that the change could make the event more thrilling for spectators. “It’s more exciting for the fans and the people watching,” Norris noted, emphasizing that a shorter, more intense weekend could increase the drama both on the track and on television. Norris’s comments come after his own memorable victory at Monaco in 2025, where he secured pole position and went on to win the Grand Prix during his title‑winning campaign.
That experience gives him a personal perspective on how delicate the balance is between pushing the car to its limits and staying within the razor‑thin margin for error that Monaco demands. The shift to a Sprint weekend also has broader implications for teams. With only one practice session, engineers will need to be ultra‑efficient in gathering telemetry, adjusting aerodynamics, and fine‑tuning suspension settings. The usual iterative process of testing a setup over three sessions will be replaced by a rapid, high‑pressure sprint of data collection and decision‑making.
Teams that can analyse the limited data quickly and translate it into a competitive car setup will have a clear advantage. From a strategic standpoint, the Sprint race itself will award points to the top eight finishers, meaning that a strong performance on Saturday could significantly influence the championship battle. Drivers will have to weigh the risk of pushing hard for Sprint points against the need to preserve the car for the main Grand Prix on Sunday.
In a circuit where a single mistake can end a race, the balance between aggression and caution becomes even more delicate. Fans can look forward to a more compact, high‑octane weekend at Monaco, with the added excitement of a Sprint race that could reshuffle the grid before the traditional Sunday showdown. The format change is expected to generate fresh storylines and potentially alter the usual hierarchy of teams and drivers at the principality’s storied venue. The 2027 season will continue to roll out across a diverse set of circuits, with the next race being the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, part of a triple‑header weekend from September 24‑26.
That event will also be broadcast live on Sky Sports F1, with the Baku race scheduled for a Saturday, offering viewers another chance to see how teams adapt to the evolving calendar and its new Sprint challenges.