Martin Pakula feared war in the Middle East would stop some F1 teams from reaching Melbourne

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“There were moments when we weren’t sure all the teams were going to get here,” he said. “I thought rather than 11 teams on the grid, we might have had nine or 10, which would have been very, very disappointing but wouldn’t have stopped the event going ahead.”

Pakula said he didn’t want to stage a “compromised event” given the amount of that had been put in.

“It would have been such a shame,” he said. “It would have been so disappointing.”

He was relieved when all teams had made it to Melbourne and that “all’s well that end’s well”.