Yas ready to paint a new chapter for season finale
abu dhabi — The engines have fallen silent, pit doors are closed, and the grandstands are empty, but Yas Marina Circuit is anything but quiet.
While motorsports fans eagerly await the start of the season-closing 2017 Formula 1 Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, the task of making sure the Circuit is ready to host the biggest race of the year is well under way.
Al Tareq Al Ameri, CEO of Yas Marina Circuit, said: “The Circuit is a hive of activity leading up to the F1. A huge amount of work goes into preparing for the race weekend to make sure the Circuit looks perfect and the fans in the grandstand and those watching on TV around the world enjoy the best F1 experience.
“Since our first Grand Prix in 2009 we have been finely tuning our operations. It’s a massive logis- tical task that is the culmination of 12 months’ meticulous planning.”
To make sure the Circuit is at its best for when the world’s best racing drivers arrive, 4,500 litres of ‘Yas blue’ paint, 720 litres of ivory, 1,440 litres of red and 1,440 litres of white paint will be applied by teams of painters.
The paint weighs between 2-3 tonnes, with 500 kgs alone being applied to kerbing each day.
The track’s famous ‘Yas blue’ is unique to Yas Marina Circuit. Called pantone 321, the colour was chosen as it closely resembles the blue seas of the Arabian Gulf. The team tasked with painting the track’s distinctive white edging will have to cover a total of 26 kilometres. These are painted four times, which requires 450 litres of white paint. The record number of steps taken by a single track painter is 42,000.
Thanks to the wider cars competing in the 2017 F1 Championship, the grid markings on the start/ finish line have been removed and replaced with markings that are 200mm wider than previous slots to accommodate them.
Clearing away months of sand and dust from the Circuit’s grandstands is another important task for the cleaners, who are all equipped with high-pressure hoses, while the 75 acres of landscaped areas are given some TLC by gardeners who will plant 715 palm trees and 150,000 flowers before the race.
It’s not just the Circuit that is cleaned and polished before the F1 weekend beings. Every inch of the hotels on Yas Island, including the famous ‘glowing facade’ of the Yas Viceroy, are left sparkling in time for guest to check in, while teams of street cleaners make sure the island’s roads are looking their best.
While the huge cleaning operation is going on, behind the scenes the business of Formula 1 is getting into full swing ahead of race weekend on November 23-26.
After 20 rounds of the 2017 F1® season it’s hard to predict what will happen in the big finale, but Yas Marina Circuit is guaranteed to be looking its very best.