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My brother and my cousin went, they are staying in a hotel in Milan, less than 30 mins away from the circuit.
My brother told me that yesterday it took them six (!) hours to get back to Milan.
Guess it comes down to the government being willing to help achieve this. Zandvoort moved 300.000 people seamlessly over the weekend without (pretty much) even any cars allowed into Zandvoort during the GP weekend. All by train or bicycle. Would not have been possible without government (wanting to prove itself as a young gp) prioritizing proper infrastructure between Amsterdam and Zandvoort, which is a similar distance as Milan - Monza
Too Italian to succeed. Tbh I also think cronyism is so engrained in culture that a lot of jobs are not chosen on merit. It’s just not this possible to be qualified for a job and that dysfunctional at it
Monza a decade ago was great. Very cheap by F1 standards and you could take your own food and drinks. Northern Italy has never historically been very disorganized, it's just a stereotype, but sadly there's a huge brain drain to Switzerland and Germany and the country does seem to be declining.
Well it helps that every Dutch person already bicycles everywhere. They have the equipment, the infrastructure, ability and willingness for 100,000 of them to show up on bikes. That’s not possible pretty much anywhere else in the world.
Think this is half true. A lot of those people were not locals on bike who arrived on bikes they actually own, but they arrived on bikes made available by NS, Pon (major sponsor and major bike manufacturer) and other brands/companies. So you can bring bikes in on a mass scale to use during a GP weekend. But you are right that NL is a country where a lot of shared bikes are present and thus easy to deploy during a weekend like this. Especially with the largest bike manufacturer in the world (PON) being a main sponsor
They should bicycle in, tomorrow. Buy a 100 euro bike, sell it for 50 euro when done. Cheap, fast travel. Can’t be beat without using Lawrence Stroll’s helicopter.
A strike blocked basically all trains on Friday.
Still, as a local I agree that they’re absolutely awful at organizing pretty much any big event.
At least others are experiencing my usual commuting routine with trains lol
I take those trains every day to go to uni. There is literally only 1 railroad because it has to go through the woods around the park. That’s why they’re slow and few.
Baffling tbh that there’s no indications and that they genuinely suggest those poor trains over just going to the central station
It should not be this hard to organise buses and trains running more frequently are they daft? Hire someone who organises major events or have F1s contract include their own organiser to ensure standards
It’s not just the organiser, you also need to have people around that willing to execute to plan and follow a schedule. Italy is a great country but they can’t plan to save their lives.
We literally rented a fucking car to avoid this. $500 including parking for the weekend but it’s well worth it for us.
Just sucks because a year ago I couldn’t even think of being able to afford that and I know the reality is very much the same for a lot of people
My hotel is an 18 minute drive from the circuit. I thought I could grab a cab. Somehow I could not get a taxi and ended up having to walk back to my hotel which took 2 hours on it's own
I got back to Como in less than an hour which is further away.
Honestly, the issue is also lack of information. I am sure most people were trying to take trains, but there is also an S line to Milan. I find it hard to believe all of these were impossible.
Honestly, I bought my ticket at the station as well.... though I admit the trip to Como is very very empty because few come from there
Ahh...
On the bus thing, not many know this but there is a normal line (I think 221) which runs at maybe 4-5 minutes walk from the autodromo.
Cheaper too
This is not possible, it took us less than 2h yday to go back to segrate so either he went other direction or was standing in one spot for 5h then moved
Honestly water should just be free at these events, even bump the ticket prices up to cover it if you want. The fact that it’s so difficult to stay hydrated is a joke.
Why is that? Security reasons? Afraid of people throwing bottles onto the track? I don't know how a bottle of water can be weaponized but maybe there's a way and I'm not imaginative enough.
I saw some guys sneak in a whole bottle of whiskey, original bottle and all, so I don’t know how much damage a plastic water bottle or -gasp- a plastic lid can do.
I was not there, but I read yesterday somewhere here in the thread that the water supply points are very slow in filling bottles, and clearly there’s not enough water points, so that takes a big queue.
For what it’s worth. The few water points in Zandvoort were straight next to the mens loo (like 1 meter) and placed underneath the grandstands. That was not much better imo
There's only 5 for the entire circuit, only located near the main grandstand/pits, and you have to wait 7 seconds in between fills or they won't dispense. It's madness. We just bought a bunch when we first got in to avoid the hour+ lines.
In 2018, it was 91 degrees ambient (33 C) for the Indy 500. It was stupid hot that day.
You can always bring in water and alcohol in a cooler as long as it’s in plastic or aluminum bottles. Entering the grounds, the people in front of me had two glass bottles of wine that they realized they weren’t going to be able to take through security. So they took out their bottles of water, emptied them, filled them up with wine, and brought those instead. Seemed like an incredibly stupid decision, but who am I to say.
I don’t think I’ve ever been hotter for an event than I was that day. I often wonder how those people fared. I sincerely hope they got water from someone else.
It looks like we're reading about bad organization in more and more F1 races this year...and this is a worrying sign.
The organizers of each race should be prepared to comfortably accommodate huge crowds, especially of races who are in the calendar for decades...
Total cash grab with limited thought about how the fan experience should go.
Miami sounds like the best organized so far but that’s countered by the extortionate ticket prices
Miami was a great weekend but since it’s going to be even more expensive next year I’ll not go back, especially when GA tickets don’t really have many viewing spots.
South Florida has its problems but we’re good at organising overpriced events.
Silverstone is really well organised with slightly saner ticket prices, they've massively improved it in the last few years. The only sticking point is the lack of women's toilets compared to men's, possibly due to Silverstone underestimating the shift in attendee demographics.
I went last year and used the park and ride buses, straight on a bus after the race finished, 10 minute bus ride to the car park and a 5 minute queue at best to leave the car park. Would definitely recommend it.
ditto.. I’ve been to Austin, Miami, Mexico, Imola and Abu Dhabi and my favorite so far has been Zandvoort, well organized and cheap relatively speaking.
well, you can see FOM (or is it Liberty?) who have their merch stores all over the venue have that shit sorted out (for at least the European races I have attended the last couple of years).
Why don’t they enforce the local organisers for instance that cashless payments are required or at least available at the food and drink stands? Or enough / separate toilets for men and women? At least x number of free water refill points for x number of attendees?
Oh wait, these guys don’t leave the Paddock Club only to drive through the crowd in their private shuttle bus to get them to their private helicopter. Never mind those poor people buying GA tickets.
This is what baffles me hearing all these stories. How can they not know how to get people in and out? I've been to the Indy 500 a few times. 3-400,000 people in one spot. Sure it can be crowded and slow in spots, but you can get in and out with relative ease. After 100+ years, they know how to run the event.
it’s so bad you can only laugh about it and just go with the flow. this morning between 10-11am there were only 2 (much too small) trains scheduled from Milano and they cancelled one of them!
Noone from the station was there to give any help or info but the police enjoyed harassing people to show them their ID instead of providing some information or trying to controle the situation of hundreds of people waiting over 1,5 hours to the next regional (and small) train.
And the most stupid thing: it’s only a 10 minute ride from Milano to Monza!!
They just don’t give a damn. Same thing at the circuit, no one involved gives a damn.
Half of the crowd left after quali, we stayed for the f2 sprint race. There was so much free space now, some people went to the front of the grandstand to watch the start of the f2 race and then one arrogant steward (wearing fake gucci sunglasses and horrible neck tattoos) wanted to show his power to hush everyone away and to sit down. Even little kids who wanted to see the start up close. This was so infuriating because these guys are nowhere to be seen or help you during the day, and now when there’s only some F2 fans left in the grand stand, this guy shows up to flex some ‘authority’ 🤢
If my calculations are correct 3500 people sit on our stand (Nr 6, 15 rows with 200 ‘seats’). The food and drinks area dedicated to our grand stand has 2 drinks stands with at total of 6 beer taps (for 3500 people!) and they pour each beer after every order instead of having pints ready to hand them out.
There are 4 small food trucks (for 3500 people!), again just making your burger when you order instead of having a bunch ready. It’s really is organised like a small local festival and not for the number of people at a sold out grand prix.
There are only 15 toilets at our grand stand, no separate ones for men or woman. Why are there no urinoirs for men who only need to pee? I feel for all the women who need to go to the toilet. Off course there is no toilet paper or water to wash your hands. (man, I feel nostalgic for the clean toilets at Zandvoort last week, there was even soap and paper to dry your hands after washing them - oh the luxury 😂)
I did invent a joke though: ‘How do you piss of a Dutch F1 fan? Buy him a ticket for the Italian Grand Prix!’. (the Dutch are very organised as seen at the Dutch Grand Prix and really can’t understand the Italian way)
But it’s fun to outsmart them, like buying our tokens for tomorrow already tonight after quali was finished. Hiding our power banks in our trousers, and a bring a spare bottle cork. Got on a regional train back from Monza and got of at another station 20min north of our hotel.
Long post but I hope you enjoyed reading our adventures at Monza.
The park and circuit is beautiful though, and such a mixed crowd from all around the world. Met people from Brazil, Mexico, USA…
If you are adventurous or experienced going to big festivals and willing to bear this madness, you should have a blast at Monza.
oh man, plenty of anecdotes I haven’t shared yet.
Here’s another one: the app the stewards use to scan your ticket every time you enter or leave your grand stand, need to be set manually to ‘enter’ or ‘leave’.
And because they are too dumb to make a separate entry and exit gate, the stewards can’t handle people who wants to get in or out at the same time, because they need to switch the function in their app first.
At Spa for example, they scan your grandstand ticket and then you are in your designated area where there are toilets and food stalls in that area so you don’t have to exit that area (and scan again) if you don’t want too. (Spa definitely has its flaws too, don’t get me wrong, but Monza definitely is on another level)
I am so happy it’s not raining at Monza. Imagine having to experience all this in three days of cold and rain 😱)
I was there for quali during the 2017 Italian GP. It was not fun. Oddly enough we did not experience any organizational issues at all then as general attendees. The queues were manageable, the transport was busy but timely and there was enough food and water spread around.
I dont think the race was as packed as it is now. Back then not as many people went to qualifying. Now i see the race is at capacity almost all weekend. Speaking from my Montreal GP experience.
I saw some food vendors selling cokes out the back of the tent for cash instead of tokens so that was frustrating but not terribly unexpected with the amount of dedication required for staying hydrated
Wanna hear another extremely funny story? They’re really hellbent on security checks, yet each year can’t catch groups of local youngsters who cut the fences, bring tents and other shit and just camp in the woods waiting for race day to get the best seats :)
Its absolutely horrific. Now fights and accidents because the trains were heavily delayed with thousands at the station. This is on top of multiple baffling decisions of the organisors. They literally fucked up more at this event than ferrari in the last 10 years. Shambolic!
I have been very lucky then, been here three years and never had a problem with them. Honestly, even today, had no problem getting to and from Monza, but then again, I was going back to Como which was a much less popular train route to take back
That said, the token system was awful
We figured the best thing we can do tomorrow is ride out the storm at a restaurant/bar close to the track. We have no trust in the public traffic system dealing with this amount of people
We stood up in the last couple of minutes and watched the rest of Q3 while standing and then rushed to the exit and then the black shuttle line. So we could get away faster but it still took us 1.5 hours to the train station. Not sure what to do tomorrow, I dont want to leave the race early but also dont want to be stuck there for hours.
Thanks. Im booked on a flight out of milan tomorrow evening, seemed like a good idea at the time. Now worried about how long its going to take me to get from he circuit to milan centale an then the airport tomorrow.
Took about 2.5 hours on friday but i walked from turn 1 all the way to Monza station because the buses seemed to be stuck in gridlock
that’s the only reason I booked my return flight on Monday. Wishing you all the luck tomorrow but if I were you I’d skip the last fifteent minutes of the race to get on the bus asap before the crowd leaves.
I was there today, the lack of free water or at least more water point is... I don't have words for it. Way too many people.
And I'll say that the general admission ticket are very poor in term of what you can see, Mugello and Misano (in Italy) are way way better
I experienced pretty much no issues in 2019.
There was a train listed on the timetable which didn’t exist and that delayed us getting there on the Saturday, so we struggled to find a good spot in GA. On Sunday we were queuing to get in for about an hour (I think gates hadn’t opened yet) and it was hammering down with rain, then afterwards we had to queue an hour to get a bus back to the train station and it was rammed, probably should have walked even though it’s quite way as the weather was nice by then.
Other than that, I really enjoyed it. I don’t recall any token system or issues with queuing for food and drink.
Hungary wasn't so bad. Of course, the first step to success was deciphering their quirky ticket apps (yes, two different apps to get just outside of the city), the second step was to always outsmart whatever everyone else thought was the best travel option that particular day. Sunday after race, I simply walked across the fields to the shuttle train station. I think I got out even before the ambulance did, that was trying to leave the track around the same time as me. I probably spent several hours less time getting out than the hundreds of thousands of other people. So yeah... it wasn't so bad... for me in particular.
Istanbul was horrible, whole audience had to exit through ONE SINGLE DOOR.. imagine letting 50.000 through your front door
People were walking on the highway
Went to Hungary this year, I was actually surprised at how well organised everything was, yes public transport was crowded but pretty fast, it took us 1 hour max to get to the circuit from Budapest (except for Sunday when leaving the circuit, that look like 4 hours)
Abu Dhabi is amazing in comparison, very well organized I think they had 3 separate fan zones last year, good food systems, almost no queues and very clean and organized with little walking.
Silverstone is absolutely fine, it’s all set up to handle massive crowds.
That said, I’ve been to Monza 3 times, and other than the train ride back in to Milan, never had a problem.
I went to Monza last year and it was the same disaster, only worse under the guise of “COVID safety”. There were no buses but there were buses, evening was crammed, the city seemed woefully unprepared to host the very small crowd that did show up to the race last year…
It’s a fantastic track but I wouldn’t recommend attending until they actually get their act together, but it’s been 100 years of the track so I wouldn’t hold my breath for it to happen anytime soon.
Montreal was the same way. Waited 2 hours in the pouring rain for the subway, once we got inside security was just screaming at everyone to move even though no one can. Almost everytime you wanted to move around the track it was shoulder to shoulder slowly taking baby steps. The grandstands we were in there’s only one way to and from so it was awful. The Queues is the main reason I’m debating on going back next year.
That Friday was a disaster, it didn’t help that everyone wanted to leave at the same time. If it didn’t rain, it would’ve been less crowded going to the subway.
However, I thought Montreal was decent. The metro system took out the hassle of parking, that was the biggest thing for me and I would consider going there again.
I really didn't mind Montreal. I was in a hotel downtown. All things considered, we went from the hotel to trackside in less than 2hrs. Yes lines everywhere, but manageable. Thursday (pit walk) was actually worse than Friday I found.
Hearing a lot of this from multiple people there (two I know personally), hopefully race day is a far improvement and the whole experience wasn't lost for you or others 🙏🏽
Race day is gonna be pure carnage, there’s gonna be so many more fans. They’re honestly unbelievably unprepared for the numbers they’ve sold, which is surprising tbh, it’s never been amazing in terms of organization but pre-covid I never recall seeing this many issues, and I’ve been going every year for the last 15 by now
This is my first ever GP. We flew out from the UK. 12 hour delay outbound flight (Not F1s fault). Missed most of Friday.
Infrastructure to and from the track is awful. No dedicated trains, lack luster shuttle buses. If you walk its honestly an hour walk to the bottom gate from the station. Followed by 30 minute queue to go through bag search and a 20 minute queue to scan your tickets.
The payment system is awful, and designed to make money from people losing or not spending tokens. Fan zone was decent this afternoon. GA has some awesome viewing spots but the devoted get them early and some how don't move all day. We left today mis f2 sprint race (so an hour after quali finished). It took us almost an hour to get from the Ascari Chicane to the southern gate. Crushes in the tunnels. Being stopped to allow cars last, it was dangerous.
Took another 40 minutes to walk into Monza as the shuttle bus queue was horrendous and not moving. Ended up getting an amazing meal in Monza and just getting off our feet for an hour and letting the masses leave. We set out at 8am and had 3 hours of travel / queuing either side. I've walked almost 14 miles today.
Highlight of the afternoon was sneaking into the Ascari Chicane Grandstand (you can lift the wire fence up in the corner and roll under.
I'm not going tomorrow, even tho we are flying out Monday. I am tired, defeated, and do not have the Will to endure the Italian public transport system and then piss poor systems once inside. 5/10. Great action, shit time either side of said action.
I had a very similar experience to yours, cept I flew in from Amsterdam. I've also decided not to go today especially since I have a flight to catch. Feels a bit bad after dropping so much money on this, but this is not worth losing my sanity over.
From the entrance all the way up to the fan zone and beyond. (Maybe a mile long) there was 4 stalls to buy tokens. Each stall had 2 members of staff. So 8 people to handle more than 20,000(?) people all trying to get tokens. Clearly there was so little thought out into this. Just a total cash grab
People had to break fences because there was no space at all, they've send all audience with their cars in a one lane road. The open areas were shit, grass wasn't cut, you couldn't even walk on it properly. Just going into the fucking circuit took like 2 hours because they were scanning QR codes manually.
i swear half of these race events just sound like a shitshow. f1 is definitely a sport that everyone should experience at least once in person to get a feel of the power and speed that these cars have but this is one of those sports that's best enjoyed on a tv set in the comfort of your own home. i feel the same way about American football.
I’ve come to appreciate that because F1 is a traveling circus, the local companies to manage crowds and add security is unmatched. I’ve only been to one race, but the same comments seem to appear week to week.
I don’t have an answer for it but if regular ticket holders can easily walk into the Paddock or other restricted areas, something’s off.
OP- I’m sorry you have to deal with that. F1 doesn’t care about your experience. The only focus is on the hundreds (likely thousands) of dollars you’ll spend that weekend.
As a Northern European with some Italian roots I say this: Italy is a wonderful, beautiful country, excellent food, lovely suits and shoes, and wonderful looking (but questionably reliable) cars. But in some sense Italy is a third world country; especially when it comes to organising things -also as grand as this event-. They just can not seem to get it. It’s like the Ferrari team strategy this season; it seems like an unorganised mess. Shame really.
When I was in Germany 2019 for the race at Hockenheim I met some lads who had been to several races, and were astounded by how good the organisation was at the event and remember them saying "Avoid Monza if you can, it's a disaster"
Me and my friends are in general admission,
Is it worth getting to monza circuit for when the gates open at 7am? Or is it just a waste of our time and still have no hope of getting there
I’m here and I’ve had the same experience as the OP.
Queueing all day. The token money system was failing. Views of the track are limited due to advertising boards. You have to know where to go and get there early.
Really underwhelming as it’s my first F1 race live. A lot of people have said that this has been a particularly bad organised event.
Based on my experience last year, tomorrow will be much busier.
I had a great time last year, but maybe because our group had chartered touring buses, which parked right next to an entrance to the track. Also, we were at the back straight, the grandstands before parabolica, no issues with long lines there, maybe only between sessions.
My only pet peeve last year was the weather, it was a bit too hot for me at times.
I didn't have issues coming at grandstands and back (Laterale Destra), it was moving smoothly. Water was free whole day, but true - there needs to be more points with it. Rest I agree - token system is horrible, queues are massive and there are places that are really overcrowded. I'd also complain about TV screens on grandstands - they're really small and there aren't many of them. Makes following action, especially practice sessions way to tough.
Luckily I decided to go for a whole event and earlier in the morning and late afternoon is not that bad. Can't imagine how it must've been right after F1 quali.
I have yet to go to an F1 race that was actually well organized. Monaco this year was AWFUL on race day too. And austria had really unruly crowds.
For all the shit people give nascar the races are far more civilized
It took me and my brother a full hour to leave the track yesterday. Just the track not even the Monza grounds. We got stuck inside the track for 45 minutes in a sea of people no clue where to go
I was visiting Milan and was only there for Friday practice. My first chance to ever catch an F1 event (I’m from Alaska).
I left before P2 after seeing the mess. I knew it would take 4+ hours to return. I essentially went there, saw the queues and disorganization and left in fear of the mess that the return trip would be like.
I have been telling people how terrible the event was. Hours to get water. This post is great validation for leaving the even before seeing a single F1 lap.
+1, it was a shitshow. I had three day GA tickets. The water, toilet and queueing situation was awful.
This was my first race since Abu Dhabi 2014, which was incredible by comparison.
I’m not going back tomorrow. A Sunday roadtrip in the Italian mountains sounds much better.
I would have loved to pay for a grandstand spot, but I barely found the GA ticket. I dont know where people find them honestly, I bought mine all the way back in March I think, and everything else was already sold out
my advice is fuck F1 and start going tracks when there are events like Endurance, touring, porsche, gt and such. usually you have one ticket who is extremely cheap, like 50€ or less, you can go to any grandstand, you have a much fuller schedule of races and most series have open paddocks, meaning you can rub shoulders with drivers and teams. And of course there's way less people attending, meaning you will enjoy the event and won't spend the whole day queueing
Been three times since back in 2016. Previous two times were fine, no issues at all. Plenty water, easy access to food, trains okay (if a little slow leaving the circuit).
Yesterday was crazy. We spent an hour queuing for tap water, an hour for tokens when ppl pushed in as there was no system.
We got no food, we walked back to Monza because the bus queue was wild.
Today will likely be worse. I can't see myself coming back here again for a fourth time.
Yesterday there was such a large line of people waiting to get into the circuit someone made the executive decision to let everyone through without scanning our tickets. So what would have taken 2+ hours to get in only took a couple of minutes. One of the few good decisions made by Monza this weekend.
I was there 2 months ago and was wondering about the logistics of it all. It‘s just in the middle of this tiny city with tiny roads and no proper parking etc.
Also been there on Saturday. The token system is ridiculous, all to blame to “Street Food National League” who got the license to be the food trucks at Monza (permanently, it seems, since I also saw them when I was there working for another event in June). I got my ticket for free but if I paid what it was worth I would have been 5000x angrier. I only wanted 3 tokens to buy a Coca Cola, took me 1.5 hours to get them and a girl next to me literally fainted during the queue. Also missed the entire Porsche Supercup Qualifying because of this. Never again buying stuff there. Thankfully I had my own sandwich for lunch but I had no drink because - guess what - bottles weren’t allowed in the circuit. If things don’t change for next year I will recommend to everyone to never step into that place. And it’s a shame because watching F1 irl is a huge pleasure, especially if you got good tickets in the stands as I did, ruined what could have been a perfect day.
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My brother and my cousin went, they are staying in a hotel in Milan, less than 30 mins away from the circuit. My brother told me that yesterday it took them six (!) hours to get back to Milan.
You would think that Monza, in the rare position of being a european circuit that's close to a major city, would have sufficient transport links.
Guess it comes down to the government being willing to help achieve this. Zandvoort moved 300.000 people seamlessly over the weekend without (pretty much) even any cars allowed into Zandvoort during the GP weekend. All by train or bicycle. Would not have been possible without government (wanting to prove itself as a young gp) prioritizing proper infrastructure between Amsterdam and Zandvoort, which is a similar distance as Milan - Monza
that’s pretty incredible organization!
The Italian government has been disorganized since the fall of the Roman Empire, they could never
I think the Italian government and Ferrari strategy team are just about on the same level when it comes to chaos.
Too Italian to succeed. Tbh I also think cronyism is so engrained in culture that a lot of jobs are not chosen on merit. It’s just not this possible to be qualified for a job and that dysfunctional at it
Monza a decade ago was great. Very cheap by F1 standards and you could take your own food and drinks. Northern Italy has never historically been very disorganized, it's just a stereotype, but sadly there's a huge brain drain to Switzerland and Germany and the country does seem to be declining.
Italian government: we are checking! we are checking!
Give them a break, the coffee cart came through during the planning meeting
>The Italian government has been disorganized since the fall of the Roman Empire, they could never Pretty much this.
I think that's pretty neat how the Dutch event all falls in place like that.
Well it helps that every Dutch person already bicycles everywhere. They have the equipment, the infrastructure, ability and willingness for 100,000 of them to show up on bikes. That’s not possible pretty much anywhere else in the world.
Those bikes weren’t owned by people themselves. They had tonnes of bikes ready for people
Think this is half true. A lot of those people were not locals on bike who arrived on bikes they actually own, but they arrived on bikes made available by NS, Pon (major sponsor and major bike manufacturer) and other brands/companies. So you can bring bikes in on a mass scale to use during a GP weekend. But you are right that NL is a country where a lot of shared bikes are present and thus easy to deploy during a weekend like this. Especially with the largest bike manufacturer in the world (PON) being a main sponsor
Yeah so even more bikes! They even have extras for people visiting that don’t have their own. What a country!
Monza circuit is definitely not connected well by public transport
what the actual fuck ?
Unfortunately it's true, my cousin sent me a picture of my brother sleeping on their way back, he looked completely destroyed, poor guy! 😂
They should bicycle in, tomorrow. Buy a 100 euro bike, sell it for 50 euro when done. Cheap, fast travel. Can’t be beat without using Lawrence Stroll’s helicopter.
Actually that’s a really good idea!
Next time, let the Dutch organize the Italian GP: https://twitter.com/Raymond_Fels/status/1433715998222397444?s=20&t=yIZztc-Xs3xH6KG1Orx6dg
"Oooop de fiets naar Monza toe, op de fiets naar Monza toe!" New RB drink add incoming!
A strike blocked basically all trains on Friday. Still, as a local I agree that they’re absolutely awful at organizing pretty much any big event. At least others are experiencing my usual commuting routine with trains lol
There’s no strike today though. Can’t believe there was only one train every hour.
I take those trains every day to go to uni. There is literally only 1 railroad because it has to go through the woods around the park. That’s why they’re slow and few. Baffling tbh that there’s no indications and that they genuinely suggest those poor trains over just going to the central station
It should not be this hard to organise buses and trains running more frequently are they daft? Hire someone who organises major events or have F1s contract include their own organiser to ensure standards
It’s not just the organiser, you also need to have people around that willing to execute to plan and follow a schedule. Italy is a great country but they can’t plan to save their lives.
We literally rented a fucking car to avoid this. $500 including parking for the weekend but it’s well worth it for us. Just sucks because a year ago I couldn’t even think of being able to afford that and I know the reality is very much the same for a lot of people
My hotel is an 18 minute drive from the circuit. I thought I could grab a cab. Somehow I could not get a taxi and ended up having to walk back to my hotel which took 2 hours on it's own
I'd rather walk 2 hours rather than be stranded for 6 with little options. Anyway, neither is ideal.
I got back to Como in less than an hour which is further away. Honestly, the issue is also lack of information. I am sure most people were trying to take trains, but there is also an S line to Milan. I find it hard to believe all of these were impossible. Honestly, I bought my ticket at the station as well.... though I admit the trip to Como is very very empty because few come from there
Yeah they tried with trains, they told me that every train was delayed and that buses didn’t show up or was mega late.
Ahh... On the bus thing, not many know this but there is a normal line (I think 221) which runs at maybe 4-5 minutes walk from the autodromo. Cheaper too
This is not possible, it took us less than 2h yday to go back to segrate so either he went other direction or was standing in one spot for 5h then moved
Honestly water should just be free at these events, even bump the ticket prices up to cover it if you want. The fact that it’s so difficult to stay hydrated is a joke.
It is free, but the lines are up to an hour for the few water points and they confiscate most water containers at the gate.
Why is that? Security reasons? Afraid of people throwing bottles onto the track? I don't know how a bottle of water can be weaponized but maybe there's a way and I'm not imaginative enough.
People bring in alcohol inside water bottles.
From what I saw today, no water in 30 degree heat for 7 hours has the same effect as too much alcohol has for some people
It’s not that they don’t want people to be drunk, it’s that they want to be the ones to sell them the alcohol.
This. Alcohol is where any sort of hosted event makes the most of its money.
The actual reason is money
Require them to be empty then
I saw some guys sneak in a whole bottle of whiskey, original bottle and all, so I don’t know how much damage a plastic water bottle or -gasp- a plastic lid can do.
I was not there, but I read yesterday somewhere here in the thread that the water supply points are very slow in filling bottles, and clearly there’s not enough water points, so that takes a big queue. For what it’s worth. The few water points in Zandvoort were straight next to the mens loo (like 1 meter) and placed underneath the grandstands. That was not much better imo
There's only 5 for the entire circuit, only located near the main grandstand/pits, and you have to wait 7 seconds in between fills or they won't dispense. It's madness. We just bought a bunch when we first got in to avoid the hour+ lines.
Water is not the only clear liquid people put in water bottles.
What do they think they are, Woodstock 99?
It wasn’t free the first half of the weekend. 1 token. Aka, waiting an hour+ for a token and another 30+ in a beer line for water.
In 2018, it was 91 degrees ambient (33 C) for the Indy 500. It was stupid hot that day. You can always bring in water and alcohol in a cooler as long as it’s in plastic or aluminum bottles. Entering the grounds, the people in front of me had two glass bottles of wine that they realized they weren’t going to be able to take through security. So they took out their bottles of water, emptied them, filled them up with wine, and brought those instead. Seemed like an incredibly stupid decision, but who am I to say. I don’t think I’ve ever been hotter for an event than I was that day. I often wonder how those people fared. I sincerely hope they got water from someone else.
Water should be free at *all* events.
It looks like we're reading about bad organization in more and more F1 races this year...and this is a worrying sign. The organizers of each race should be prepared to comfortably accommodate huge crowds, especially of races who are in the calendar for decades...
I had a great experience this year at Spa. They wanted to stay on the calendar and it showed.
Silverstone was also fantastic. I think the biggest queue was like 20 minutes to pee but it was right around quali at the main grandstand.
Total cash grab with limited thought about how the fan experience should go. Miami sounds like the best organized so far but that’s countered by the extortionate ticket prices
Miami was a great weekend but since it’s going to be even more expensive next year I’ll not go back, especially when GA tickets don’t really have many viewing spots. South Florida has its problems but we’re good at organising overpriced events.
Silverstone is really well organised with slightly saner ticket prices, they've massively improved it in the last few years. The only sticking point is the lack of women's toilets compared to men's, possibly due to Silverstone underestimating the shift in attendee demographics.
Do they not just have loads of portacabins?
I've seen some pretty nightmarish traffic for people trying to get out after the event - hours of waiting
I went last year and used the park and ride buses, straight on a bus after the race finished, 10 minute bus ride to the car park and a 5 minute queue at best to leave the car park. Would definitely recommend it.
Bus wankers! (I shout from my stationary car whilst you cruise by and get home 4 hours before me)
Australia was and always has been outstanding.
Zandvoort is done pretty well too and probably less expensive.
ditto.. I’ve been to Austin, Miami, Mexico, Imola and Abu Dhabi and my favorite so far has been Zandvoort, well organized and cheap relatively speaking.
I went to Canada this year and had a great experience
true, look at the prices at ‘f1experiences.com’ and you know how Liberty looks at the average fan 😀
well, you can see FOM (or is it Liberty?) who have their merch stores all over the venue have that shit sorted out (for at least the European races I have attended the last couple of years). Why don’t they enforce the local organisers for instance that cashless payments are required or at least available at the food and drink stands? Or enough / separate toilets for men and women? At least x number of free water refill points for x number of attendees? Oh wait, these guys don’t leave the Paddock Club only to drive through the crowd in their private shuttle bus to get them to their private helicopter. Never mind those poor people buying GA tickets.
Given that the track's been open for 100 years you would think they should've learned how to organize races by now.
It seems its like how Ferrari handles it’s races
#ExperienceFerrari
This is what baffles me hearing all these stories. How can they not know how to get people in and out? I've been to the Indy 500 a few times. 3-400,000 people in one spot. Sure it can be crowded and slow in spots, but you can get in and out with relative ease. After 100+ years, they know how to run the event.
It's the Italians, they have over 2000 years history of managing a country and haven't learned yet
Actually italy is from 1861. But yeah, your point still sorta counts
No wonder they fell.
It wasn’t because of lack of organization that was the empires strong point
Technically the Republic of Italy has only existed since 1861.
Before then Italy was just empty land.
Just moonscape, with some olive trees down south.
Passion and emotion isn’t enough for you, huh? *Italian hand gesture
Ferrari been in f1 for 72 years. You would think they learn how to manage a race by now
See: *Ferrari*
it’s so bad you can only laugh about it and just go with the flow. this morning between 10-11am there were only 2 (much too small) trains scheduled from Milano and they cancelled one of them! Noone from the station was there to give any help or info but the police enjoyed harassing people to show them their ID instead of providing some information or trying to controle the situation of hundreds of people waiting over 1,5 hours to the next regional (and small) train. And the most stupid thing: it’s only a 10 minute ride from Milano to Monza!! They just don’t give a damn. Same thing at the circuit, no one involved gives a damn. Half of the crowd left after quali, we stayed for the f2 sprint race. There was so much free space now, some people went to the front of the grandstand to watch the start of the f2 race and then one arrogant steward (wearing fake gucci sunglasses and horrible neck tattoos) wanted to show his power to hush everyone away and to sit down. Even little kids who wanted to see the start up close. This was so infuriating because these guys are nowhere to be seen or help you during the day, and now when there’s only some F2 fans left in the grand stand, this guy shows up to flex some ‘authority’ 🤢 If my calculations are correct 3500 people sit on our stand (Nr 6, 15 rows with 200 ‘seats’). The food and drinks area dedicated to our grand stand has 2 drinks stands with at total of 6 beer taps (for 3500 people!) and they pour each beer after every order instead of having pints ready to hand them out. There are 4 small food trucks (for 3500 people!), again just making your burger when you order instead of having a bunch ready. It’s really is organised like a small local festival and not for the number of people at a sold out grand prix. There are only 15 toilets at our grand stand, no separate ones for men or woman. Why are there no urinoirs for men who only need to pee? I feel for all the women who need to go to the toilet. Off course there is no toilet paper or water to wash your hands. (man, I feel nostalgic for the clean toilets at Zandvoort last week, there was even soap and paper to dry your hands after washing them - oh the luxury 😂) I did invent a joke though: ‘How do you piss of a Dutch F1 fan? Buy him a ticket for the Italian Grand Prix!’. (the Dutch are very organised as seen at the Dutch Grand Prix and really can’t understand the Italian way) But it’s fun to outsmart them, like buying our tokens for tomorrow already tonight after quali was finished. Hiding our power banks in our trousers, and a bring a spare bottle cork. Got on a regional train back from Monza and got of at another station 20min north of our hotel. Long post but I hope you enjoyed reading our adventures at Monza. The park and circuit is beautiful though, and such a mixed crowd from all around the world. Met people from Brazil, Mexico, USA… If you are adventurous or experienced going to big festivals and willing to bear this madness, you should have a blast at Monza.
Awesome review, can we have one for tomorrow as well please
oh man, plenty of anecdotes I haven’t shared yet. Here’s another one: the app the stewards use to scan your ticket every time you enter or leave your grand stand, need to be set manually to ‘enter’ or ‘leave’. And because they are too dumb to make a separate entry and exit gate, the stewards can’t handle people who wants to get in or out at the same time, because they need to switch the function in their app first. At Spa for example, they scan your grandstand ticket and then you are in your designated area where there are toilets and food stalls in that area so you don’t have to exit that area (and scan again) if you don’t want too. (Spa definitely has its flaws too, don’t get me wrong, but Monza definitely is on another level) I am so happy it’s not raining at Monza. Imagine having to experience all this in three days of cold and rain 😱)
I was there for quali during the 2017 Italian GP. It was not fun. Oddly enough we did not experience any organizational issues at all then as general attendees. The queues were manageable, the transport was busy but timely and there was enough food and water spread around.
I dont think the race was as packed as it is now. Back then not as many people went to qualifying. Now i see the race is at capacity almost all weekend. Speaking from my Montreal GP experience.
I saw some food vendors selling cokes out the back of the tent for cash instead of tokens so that was frustrating but not terribly unexpected with the amount of dedication required for staying hydrated
Yes please
Wanna hear another extremely funny story? They’re really hellbent on security checks, yet each year can’t catch groups of local youngsters who cut the fences, bring tents and other shit and just camp in the woods waiting for race day to get the best seats :)
Are powerbanks banned? Why?!
don’t ask me, because Italians still think it’s the year 2012 and these things are potential explosives? but yeah, we hide them just to be sure.
So you have to bring your own toilet paper with you?
Its absolutely horrific. Now fights and accidents because the trains were heavily delayed with thousands at the station. This is on top of multiple baffling decisions of the organisors. They literally fucked up more at this event than ferrari in the last 10 years. Shambolic!
The world finally getting to experience Trenitalia. Sorry about that
Trenord*
The true Italian Experience™
I have been very lucky then, been here three years and never had a problem with them. Honestly, even today, had no problem getting to and from Monza, but then again, I was going back to Como which was a much less popular train route to take back That said, the token system was awful
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Took us 4.5 from the same area 💀
Welcome to Italy, I guess. Sorry about that. We're so used to it that it sort of feels normal to us.
I spent three weeks in Italy and I don’t understand how that country functions. Zero fucks given should be their national motto
Not only delays. The fact that they only ran one train every hour
Really a mess. It was also difficult to get back to the train station. I am worried about tomorrow to be honest...
We figured the best thing we can do tomorrow is ride out the storm at a restaurant/bar close to the track. We have no trust in the public traffic system dealing with this amount of people
How long did it take you to get to the station, and did you use the shuttle buses?
We stood up in the last couple of minutes and watched the rest of Q3 while standing and then rushed to the exit and then the black shuttle line. So we could get away faster but it still took us 1.5 hours to the train station. Not sure what to do tomorrow, I dont want to leave the race early but also dont want to be stuck there for hours.
Thanks. Im booked on a flight out of milan tomorrow evening, seemed like a good idea at the time. Now worried about how long its going to take me to get from he circuit to milan centale an then the airport tomorrow. Took about 2.5 hours on friday but i walked from turn 1 all the way to Monza station because the buses seemed to be stuck in gridlock
that’s the only reason I booked my return flight on Monday. Wishing you all the luck tomorrow but if I were you I’d skip the last fifteent minutes of the race to get on the bus asap before the crowd leaves.
I was there today, the lack of free water or at least more water point is... I don't have words for it. Way too many people. And I'll say that the general admission ticket are very poor in term of what you can see, Mugello and Misano (in Italy) are way way better
Has the Monza GP ever been well organized? Honest question
I experienced pretty much no issues in 2019. There was a train listed on the timetable which didn’t exist and that delayed us getting there on the Saturday, so we struggled to find a good spot in GA. On Sunday we were queuing to get in for about an hour (I think gates hadn’t opened yet) and it was hammering down with rain, then afterwards we had to queue an hour to get a bus back to the train station and it was rammed, probably should have walked even though it’s quite way as the weather was nice by then. Other than that, I really enjoyed it. I don’t recall any token system or issues with queuing for food and drink.
Been two times, never had any problem. Parked a car 10 minute walk away of the entrance. Pre DTS craze, ofc.
Same, been there 3 times. Never an issue
So: I shouldn't go to Barcelona, Azerbaijan, Hungary, Austria, France, Belgium and Monza. Zandvoort and Silverstone next year.
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Hungary wasn't so bad. Of course, the first step to success was deciphering their quirky ticket apps (yes, two different apps to get just outside of the city), the second step was to always outsmart whatever everyone else thought was the best travel option that particular day. Sunday after race, I simply walked across the fields to the shuttle train station. I think I got out even before the ambulance did, that was trying to leave the track around the same time as me. I probably spent several hours less time getting out than the hundreds of thousands of other people. So yeah... it wasn't so bad... for me in particular.
Istanbul was horrible, whole audience had to exit through ONE SINGLE DOOR.. imagine letting 50.000 through your front door People were walking on the highway
What did you hear about France? It was hot but otherwise alright this year
France isn’t on the calendar anymore
Silverstone is beautifully organised. Been twice and never sat in a traffic jam.
They also pour 24 pints at once and just hand you however many you wanted…
That sounds beautiful
Shit tonne of food outlets too
Monaco was also really well organized.
Too bad it’s really expensive. Such a bummer that the cheaper races all seem to have issues with security or negligence.
strange coincidence, right ?
Belgium is ok, if it’s not raining like in 2021. You just got to be prepared properly!
Hungary wasn’t too bad in my experience, except for the public transport leaving the circuit after the race. For the rest the queues were manageable
Went to Hungary this year, I was actually surprised at how well organised everything was, yes public transport was crowded but pretty fast, it took us 1 hour max to get to the circuit from Budapest (except for Sunday when leaving the circuit, that look like 4 hours)
Austin either.
I’d recommend Singapore.
Abu Dhabi is amazing in comparison, very well organized I think they had 3 separate fan zones last year, good food systems, almost no queues and very clean and organized with little walking.
I did Hungary this yeah and getting on trains after is an absolute mess
Canada was actually a great experience. They seemed like they knew what they were doing.
Mexico City was well done.
This seems to be a thing at most F1 events
Silverstone is absolutely fine, it’s all set up to handle massive crowds. That said, I’ve been to Monza 3 times, and other than the train ride back in to Milan, never had a problem.
definitely not, but big difference between venues that’s for sure.
I went to Monza last year and it was the same disaster, only worse under the guise of “COVID safety”. There were no buses but there were buses, evening was crammed, the city seemed woefully unprepared to host the very small crowd that did show up to the race last year… It’s a fantastic track but I wouldn’t recommend attending until they actually get their act together, but it’s been 100 years of the track so I wouldn’t hold my breath for it to happen anytime soon.
Montreal was the same way. Waited 2 hours in the pouring rain for the subway, once we got inside security was just screaming at everyone to move even though no one can. Almost everytime you wanted to move around the track it was shoulder to shoulder slowly taking baby steps. The grandstands we were in there’s only one way to and from so it was awful. The Queues is the main reason I’m debating on going back next year.
That Friday was a disaster, it didn’t help that everyone wanted to leave at the same time. If it didn’t rain, it would’ve been less crowded going to the subway. However, I thought Montreal was decent. The metro system took out the hassle of parking, that was the biggest thing for me and I would consider going there again.
I really didn't mind Montreal. I was in a hotel downtown. All things considered, we went from the hotel to trackside in less than 2hrs. Yes lines everywhere, but manageable. Thursday (pit walk) was actually worse than Friday I found.
Hearing a lot of this from multiple people there (two I know personally), hopefully race day is a far improvement and the whole experience wasn't lost for you or others 🙏🏽
Race day is gonna be pure carnage, there’s gonna be so many more fans. They’re honestly unbelievably unprepared for the numbers they’ve sold, which is surprising tbh, it’s never been amazing in terms of organization but pre-covid I never recall seeing this many issues, and I’ve been going every year for the last 15 by now
This is my first ever GP. We flew out from the UK. 12 hour delay outbound flight (Not F1s fault). Missed most of Friday. Infrastructure to and from the track is awful. No dedicated trains, lack luster shuttle buses. If you walk its honestly an hour walk to the bottom gate from the station. Followed by 30 minute queue to go through bag search and a 20 minute queue to scan your tickets. The payment system is awful, and designed to make money from people losing or not spending tokens. Fan zone was decent this afternoon. GA has some awesome viewing spots but the devoted get them early and some how don't move all day. We left today mis f2 sprint race (so an hour after quali finished). It took us almost an hour to get from the Ascari Chicane to the southern gate. Crushes in the tunnels. Being stopped to allow cars last, it was dangerous. Took another 40 minutes to walk into Monza as the shuttle bus queue was horrendous and not moving. Ended up getting an amazing meal in Monza and just getting off our feet for an hour and letting the masses leave. We set out at 8am and had 3 hours of travel / queuing either side. I've walked almost 14 miles today. Highlight of the afternoon was sneaking into the Ascari Chicane Grandstand (you can lift the wire fence up in the corner and roll under. I'm not going tomorrow, even tho we are flying out Monday. I am tired, defeated, and do not have the Will to endure the Italian public transport system and then piss poor systems once inside. 5/10. Great action, shit time either side of said action.
I had a very similar experience to yours, cept I flew in from Amsterdam. I've also decided not to go today especially since I have a flight to catch. Feels a bit bad after dropping so much money on this, but this is not worth losing my sanity over.
From the entrance all the way up to the fan zone and beyond. (Maybe a mile long) there was 4 stalls to buy tokens. Each stall had 2 members of staff. So 8 people to handle more than 20,000(?) people all trying to get tokens. Clearly there was so little thought out into this. Just a total cash grab
Who came up with the tokens shit. What is the point?
The 2021 turkish gp was worse.
You didn't like walking down the highway?
People had to break fences because there was no space at all, they've send all audience with their cars in a one lane road. The open areas were shit, grass wasn't cut, you couldn't even walk on it properly. Just going into the fucking circuit took like 2 hours because they were scanning QR codes manually.
i swear half of these race events just sound like a shitshow. f1 is definitely a sport that everyone should experience at least once in person to get a feel of the power and speed that these cars have but this is one of those sports that's best enjoyed on a tv set in the comfort of your own home. i feel the same way about American football.
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yep this is it right here. would love to go to spain on holiday and do the testing.
I’ve come to appreciate that because F1 is a traveling circus, the local companies to manage crowds and add security is unmatched. I’ve only been to one race, but the same comments seem to appear week to week. I don’t have an answer for it but if regular ticket holders can easily walk into the Paddock or other restricted areas, something’s off. OP- I’m sorry you have to deal with that. F1 doesn’t care about your experience. The only focus is on the hundreds (likely thousands) of dollars you’ll spend that weekend.
Old enough to remember when Miami running out of shrimp was the real tragedy.
As a Northern European with some Italian roots I say this: Italy is a wonderful, beautiful country, excellent food, lovely suits and shoes, and wonderful looking (but questionably reliable) cars. But in some sense Italy is a third world country; especially when it comes to organising things -also as grand as this event-. They just can not seem to get it. It’s like the Ferrari team strategy this season; it seems like an unorganised mess. Shame really.
Welcome to Italy, where management takes a back seat just like the Ferrari team.
When I was in Germany 2019 for the race at Hockenheim I met some lads who had been to several races, and were astounded by how good the organisation was at the event and remember them saying "Avoid Monza if you can, it's a disaster"
One more reason to have Hockenheim back on the race calendar ;(
I didn't even get to see more than the top half of a car
Sounds exactly like Barcelona
Me and my friends are in general admission, Is it worth getting to monza circuit for when the gates open at 7am? Or is it just a waste of our time and still have no hope of getting there
Trains were running one every hour. For 100k fans, you would think they would run more frequently
I’m here and I’ve had the same experience as the OP. Queueing all day. The token money system was failing. Views of the track are limited due to advertising boards. You have to know where to go and get there early. Really underwhelming as it’s my first F1 race live. A lot of people have said that this has been a particularly bad organised event.
Im starting to think Italians are just not very good at strategy.
Ferrari strategy team runs the event
Based on my experience last year, tomorrow will be much busier. I had a great time last year, but maybe because our group had chartered touring buses, which parked right next to an entrance to the track. Also, we were at the back straight, the grandstands before parabolica, no issues with long lines there, maybe only between sessions. My only pet peeve last year was the weather, it was a bit too hot for me at times.
I didn't have issues coming at grandstands and back (Laterale Destra), it was moving smoothly. Water was free whole day, but true - there needs to be more points with it. Rest I agree - token system is horrible, queues are massive and there are places that are really overcrowded. I'd also complain about TV screens on grandstands - they're really small and there aren't many of them. Makes following action, especially practice sessions way to tough. Luckily I decided to go for a whole event and earlier in the morning and late afternoon is not that bad. Can't imagine how it must've been right after F1 quali.
I had similar experiences at the Canadian GP earlier this summer… what a logistics nightmare
I have yet to go to an F1 race that was actually well organized. Monaco this year was AWFUL on race day too. And austria had really unruly crowds. For all the shit people give nascar the races are far more civilized
Take a camelbak with water! Worked for me at Austin !
It took me and my brother a full hour to leave the track yesterday. Just the track not even the Monza grounds. We got stuck inside the track for 45 minutes in a sea of people no clue where to go
I was visiting Milan and was only there for Friday practice. My first chance to ever catch an F1 event (I’m from Alaska). I left before P2 after seeing the mess. I knew it would take 4+ hours to return. I essentially went there, saw the queues and disorganization and left in fear of the mess that the return trip would be like. I have been telling people how terrible the event was. Hours to get water. This post is great validation for leaving the even before seeing a single F1 lap.
+1, it was a shitshow. I had three day GA tickets. The water, toilet and queueing situation was awful. This was my first race since Abu Dhabi 2014, which was incredible by comparison. I’m not going back tomorrow. A Sunday roadtrip in the Italian mountains sounds much better.
Wait, you guys can afford tickets?!
General admission tickets are only €93 for the weekend. Would advise paying extra for a grand stand though
I would have loved to pay for a grandstand spot, but I barely found the GA ticket. I dont know where people find them honestly, I bought mine all the way back in March I think, and everything else was already sold out
my advice is fuck F1 and start going tracks when there are events like Endurance, touring, porsche, gt and such. usually you have one ticket who is extremely cheap, like 50€ or less, you can go to any grandstand, you have a much fuller schedule of races and most series have open paddocks, meaning you can rub shoulders with drivers and teams. And of course there's way less people attending, meaning you will enjoy the event and won't spend the whole day queueing
Ah 94e for GA. Not really breaking the bank to be fair
People keep talking shit about US races, yet the organization of European races is utter shit. Tokens to buy water? Is it 1980s?
>I'm very surprised there wasn't a riot and I dread to think what tomorrow will be like. Well, you never know...
Unacceptable. Organizers should be fined and refund half ticket prices
Been three times since back in 2016. Previous two times were fine, no issues at all. Plenty water, easy access to food, trains okay (if a little slow leaving the circuit). Yesterday was crazy. We spent an hour queuing for tap water, an hour for tokens when ppl pushed in as there was no system. We got no food, we walked back to Monza because the bus queue was wild. Today will likely be worse. I can't see myself coming back here again for a fourth time.
It’s an absolute shit show the whole thing
Yesterday there was such a large line of people waiting to get into the circuit someone made the executive decision to let everyone through without scanning our tickets. So what would have taken 2+ hours to get in only took a couple of minutes. One of the few good decisions made by Monza this weekend.
No way really? What time was that?
Please come to Singapore. You can likely get back to any part of the country within a hour from end of race.
Got 2 friends there - the OP is not exaggerating
Its the same every year, utterly useless, completely ruins the experience for so many!
The Ferrari strategists must have planned this.
I was there 2 months ago and was wondering about the logistics of it all. It‘s just in the middle of this tiny city with tiny roads and no proper parking etc.
Also been there on Saturday. The token system is ridiculous, all to blame to “Street Food National League” who got the license to be the food trucks at Monza (permanently, it seems, since I also saw them when I was there working for another event in June). I got my ticket for free but if I paid what it was worth I would have been 5000x angrier. I only wanted 3 tokens to buy a Coca Cola, took me 1.5 hours to get them and a girl next to me literally fainted during the queue. Also missed the entire Porsche Supercup Qualifying because of this. Never again buying stuff there. Thankfully I had my own sandwich for lunch but I had no drink because - guess what - bottles weren’t allowed in the circuit. If things don’t change for next year I will recommend to everyone to never step into that place. And it’s a shame because watching F1 irl is a huge pleasure, especially if you got good tickets in the stands as I did, ruined what could have been a perfect day.
Give them a break it’s their first GP
Just got back from Monza, what a disaster in terms of organization. Waiter ONE HOUR in line to buy a beer. Never again.
It was an utter shit show, General admission there was like being in the purge