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MotoGP “not ruling out” joint F1 event under Liberty ownership

Dorna sporting director Carlos Ezpeleta says it is “not ruling out” a joint MotoGP and Formula 1 event under Liberty Media’s ownership, but admits it’s “a complicated project”.

On Monday 1 April, Liberty announced it had acquired 86% ownership of Dorna Sports and MotoGP as part of a deal valued at €4.2 billion.

With both F1 and MotoGP now under Liberty’s umbrella, talks of a potential joint race weekend for the two series has surfaced again.

In an exclusive first interview with Ezpeleta following Monday’s announcement, with Autosport’s Spanish MotoGP podcast Por Orejas, the executive says a joint event is not out of the question but isn’t something being considered in the short-term.

"Well, it's something that at the moment, for obvious reasons, is not in the immediate plans and it's not something that we are working on, but it's not something that we are ruling out for the medium-term future either,” Ezpeleta said.

“But having said that, the reality is that it makes limited sense, because at the end of the day we have some events with our own fan base, which is a different fan base in most places to the Formula 1 fan base.

“They sell, they sell out in many circuits and so do we, so getting all of us together in the same event, in the same weekend, has difficulties and the return on investment is not very clear today.

“Then you also have problems with the different sponsors, the TV cameras, so it is a project, or it would be a rather complicated project, let's say.

“Then again, there are a number of circuits that can run both [series], but there are not so many, so it is a project that is not discarded, but we are not working on it either.”

Source: Autosport

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