Abu Dhabi Grand Prix TV Times (Updated)

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Update: The BBC have issued revised times for their F1 schedule this weekend. The timings below have been updated.

It’s the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix this weekend – here’s what times you can watch the action live in Britain.

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Friday 30th October

First practice: 9:00-10:30 – BBC Red Button and online
Second practice: 13:00-14:300 – BBC Red Button and online

Saturday 31st October

Third practice: 10:00-11:30 – BBC Red Button and online
Qualifying: 12:10-14:10 – BBC One, BBC Red Button and online

Sunday 1st November

Race: 12:10-15:10 – BBC One, BBC Red Button and online

Please post details of coverage in your area in the comments.

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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53 comments on “Abu Dhabi Grand Prix TV Times (Updated)”

  1. funny isn’t it how all these new far away races end up being at a comfortable 1pm here in the UK…

    1. Bernie will say it’s to cater for European audiences.

      What he’ll actually mean is “we have too many of these far-away races to put them on in the middle of the night, Europeans have less races to go see live as it is without then having to watch their replacements at 3am”

  2. Looking at the times…how do you pronoune this?
    .
    Saturday 31th October?? Maybe 31st

    1. Methinks it should be said: “Thirtyoneth”.

      ;-)

      1. No, no, no, it’s:

        Thirstyfirst…

  3. “pronoune”

    1. haha, pedants on the internet always get jousted by their own Picard.

      1. jousted?

      2. Methinks thou mayest refer to “hoist by his own petard”.

        But, regardless, point taken and agreed with.

        Oh, my …. was I just pedantic, myself? :)

  4. Keith, thanks for the overview. But please add ‘GMT’ to the times, otherwise non-UK viewers might tune in too early or (worse) too late.

    1. god forbid! a horror scenario for any fanatic…

    2. It happened to me for qualifying at Singapore. I turned on the TV at 12.10 as usual and most confusingly I was greeted not with qualifying but Football Focus. It took me a few minutes to realise that qualifying was starting late that day.

      My advice- check the TV times more carefully on F1 Fanatic!

  5. Terry Fabulous
    27th October 2009, 8:50

    Unfortunately for East Coast Australian F1 fans, both Qually and Race are on at Midnight! Stupid night races.

    As always, ONE TV will be broadcasting Qually and the Race.

    1. That’s 1000 time better than Brazil anyday. 3am races and qualifying was pretty unbearable.

      1. I live in the ‘States so Brazill was in my time zone. I thought it was great!

      2. Terry Fabulous
        28th October 2009, 4:07

        Yeah, 3am is too late to stay up and too early to get up for you.
        I head to go to be early, wake up in the middle of the night, go back to bed and then wake up late.

        You are spot on Stephen, sucked!!!

        1. I used to like the Australian GP tv times here in Brazil… 12am was a really good time, you could stay awake and sleep after the race… now it is at 3am. Terrible time.

          But actualy I would not like to watch the races in Europe, since I love watching the races during the morning. It is quite a habit to watch the race having breakfast.

          Now, to have races at 1pm sucks… I like to watch the race and then do something else during the afternoon with my friends – since almost none of them watch F1. It seems like I had to bind my sunday afternoon to the television…

          1. Dead right it sucks. Who decided 1pm was a good time for all the races in the UK? It just feels weird watching a night race in the afternoon…the original 11am start for this one would have been better.

            Morning races are OK, late afternoon like Brazil’s always good, but my favourite time for a race is the evening. So it’s great to see the Canadian GP back, and I hope we have races in the States again soon.

    2. Stupid night races.

      Surely you mean stupid day/night races… ;-)

  6. Good times for UK. I’m up at 6 anyway so it all works out well for me. After that one horrible weekend of times at Japan I do feel very sympathetic for fanatics who nearly always are up in the middle of the night.

  7. Keith, these times are incorrect? Should be:

    Abu Dhabi, 30 October – 1 November 2009

    Friday 30
    First practice: 1300-1430 (0900-1030 GMT)
    Second practice: 1700-1830 (1300-1430 GMT)

    Saturday 31
    Third practice: 1400-1500 (1000-1100 GMT)
    Qualifying: 1700 (1300 GMT)

    Sunday 1
    Race: 1700 (1300 GMT)

    1. Currently the BBC says:

      Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
      Abu Dhabi, 30 October – 1 November 2009

      Friday 30
      First practice: 1300-1430 (0900-1030 GMT) *
      Second practice: 1700-1830 (1300-1430 GMT) *

      Saturday 31
      Third practice: 1400-1500 (1000-1100 GMT) *
      Qualifying: 1700 (1300 GMT)

      Sunday 1
      Race: 1700 (1300 GMT)
      * Practice times subject to approval

      ‘Subject to approval’ – so basically we won’t be told until the last minute!

      1. Further to this, I checked the Red Button schedule (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tv_and_radio/5345480.stm) and it says:

        Friday
        Formula 1, Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
        0855-1035 Live coverage of First Practice
        1255-1435 Live coverage of Second Practice

        I’d go with that.

    2. Keith, these times are incorrect?

      The BBC coverage and the race start at different times. Conveniently, the programme starts before the races does. Nice of them to do that, isn’t it?

    3. Thanks everyone for pointing this out, have updated the post accordingly.

  8. I do belive Nik’s timetable, any more input ???? Don’t wanna miss anything !!!!!!!

  9. Keith, those times are incorrect.

    UK time is 4 hours behind Abu Dhabi. It should be

    Friday
    Practice 1 Fri 09:00-10:30
    Practice 2 Fri 13:00-14:30
    Photo Gallery
    Saturday
    Practice 3 Sat 10:00-11:00
    Qualifying Sat 13:00-14:00
    Photo Gallery
    Sunday
    The Race Sun 13:00-15:00

    Here’s a LINK to a timetable of all the events on the Grand Prix weekend from yasmarinacircuit.com

    1. No, Keith’s times are for the BBC coverage. Your times are for the actual sessions.

      1. No they’re not: http://www.formula1.com/

        Click on ‘covert to my local time’ and they tie up with what most of us have been saying.

  10. Thanks everyone though I am completely confused now about the actual times

    1. No neeed for confusion, Steph. You may view the race on Sunday at … the exact moment that it appears on your television.

      :)

  11. i’m just going to sit and watch red button non stop for 3 days. lol

    There was talk a while ago of it being in HD? Any news on this?

    1. There was talk a while ago of it being in HD?

      No, HD is being introduced for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. 2012.

      1. Apart from the Japanese GP which is already HD and 60fps at that. Looks fantastic (torrent)! With the odd side effect of the new onboard cams only pushing 480p looking really blurry.

  12. This is really strange as i’m sure when I looked the other day the times were at the ‘normal’ UK time as Dank and others have said. But now when I check BBC red button times it comes up with different times like Keiths !
    Whats going on – when is are practice sessions!?!?!?!

    1. Both Formula1.com and autosport.com show the first practice session at 9.00am UK time. If BBC are showing it at 6am then it will be my lucky day as I will know who to back for ‘1st practice winner’ with the bookies!!!

    2. when is are practice sessions!?!?!?!

      All your base are belong to us?

      1. :) :) :)

        Excellent.

      2. Oh, give me a break! I was excited about seeing practice before it happened. I had to look up your ‘phrase’ to see what it meant – never heard that before!

  13. It looks like Timo will sadly not be racing again this weekend. It would be nice to get more information and interviews with him (as he did with Massa) as to his injuries, recovery and well-being…

    http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2009/10/10141.html

  14. confused.com

      1. it’s not. he’s just joking.

  15. Ah…and here’s where my new philosphy of not watching the race live and just avoiding the result all day comes in…

    Not only does it keep my girlfriend sweet as it means that we’re not wasting a day just for a 2 hour race…

    But also it means that I don’t have to worry about when the race is on, I just watch it on iPlayer that evening…!!

    I only wish the BBC would put an edited version up which had the full race, but not the build-up…maybe I’ll email them…

  16. Thought they already had “the wherever Grand Prix part 1” with the build-up, then “Part 2” that starts when the main commentary starts.

  17. Damn, you guys in the UK are lucky. The BBC coverage is 100 times better than SPEED channel here in the states. Too bad they don’t show the race live on BBC America. That would be officially the greatest thing ever.

  18. I am staying in Paris, France. Anyone know what tv station will be covering today? Thnx

  19. Bizarre I thought i’d put my HDTV on to bbchd and star watching qualifying in glorious hidef but I’m not sure what’s going on!?! When I search all I get are news items saying abu dhabi may be the first f1 in HD this year. But -nothing- to say “unfortunately it has been announced there is no HD f1” I actually bought an HDtv to watch it in HD two days ago!! Does anybody know anything about this? Am I just not looking in the right place for the coverage?

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