Madrid's approval date depends on who you ask
Formula 3 completed two days of running at MADRING this week as organisers tested systems that sit separately from final FIA circuit licensing. The championship sent 30 drivers from 10 teams onto the new Madrid track on 24 and 25 August. MADRING also deployed almost 300 people across safety, medical, rescue and coordination roles, with race control, communications, flags, incident management and vehicle recovery exercised under live track conditions. Luis García Abad, director of the Spanish Grand Prix, said organisers had been clear from the start that “we wanted to arrive at the Grand Prix with a fully validated and tested circuit”. Formula 3 CEO Bruno Michel called them “two very valuable days of testing” for teams and drivers. Formula 3 described the programme in advance as a way to validate sporting, operational and safety procedures before Formula 1 arrived. MADRING called the running its first general rehearsal, 120 marshals among the personnel deployed around the 5.4km circuit. The running established that Formula 3 cars could use the track and gave organisers a live rehearsal. Circuit licensing follows a separate process.
The FIA licence
Appendix O of the International Sporting Code says only circuits holding a valid FIA Circuit Licence can host competitions entered on the FIA International Sporting Calendar. For a new circuit, the regulations say: “The first licence of a new circuit project shall be issued from the date that the final inspection has been completed”. The governing body must also be satisfied with the inspection and the relevant regulatory requirements before issuing the licence. New circuits intended to host a Formula 1 World Championship round fall into the A1 inspection category. Grade 1 sits at the top of the normal circuit licence grades and covers the machinery used in Formula 1. Testing permission is separate. Appendix O allows licences restricted to competition-car testing, so cars running at a venue do not by themselves establish that the circuit holds the competition licence required for a Formula 1 race. Madrid's public record is less tidy. The original 2026 Formula 1 calendar announcement listed Madrid as subject to circuit homologation. The live championship page now carries the Spanish Grand Prix without that footnote, but does not publish a Grade 1 licence document or a separate notice confirming when final approval was granted. MADRING was already presenting the circuit as approved by the FIA during its June construction updates. RacingCircuits.info goes further, reporting that the final wearing course was completed on 31 May and that final approval for Formula 1 competition was granted on 23 June. R1V4L could not find a corresponding FIA announcement publicly confirming that 23 June approval. The date also sits awkwardly beside García Abad's earlier account of the process. Speaking to EFE during a construction visit in June 2025, the Grand Prix director said the FIA would homologate the track “definitively” during the week of the race, describing that timing as the normal procedure. He also said two further official visits would take place during construction.
Local reporting added another version this week. Telemadrid said on 24 August that the circuit was already homologated by the FIA, without identifying a licence number, grade or FIA document. Borja Carabante, Madrid's councillor for Urban Planning, Environment and Mobility, gave a different account one day later. Carabante said the Formula 3 tests were indispensable so the FIA could homologate the circuit before the Grand Prix and described the running as technical tests for validation and homologation. The claims may refer to different stages of approval. Track design approval, construction inspections, permission for testing and the final licence for competition are not interchangeable terms under Appendix O.
MADRING's June position, RacingCircuits.info's 23 June date, García Abad's earlier description of race-week final homologation and Carabante's comments after the F3 test therefore leave a public terminology problem. None of them changes the FIA rulebook governing the final competition licence. The absence of a licence document on the FIA website also does not prove that approval has not been completed. Inspection reports and administrative steps do not all have to appear as public announcements.
The F3 rehearsal
Formula 3 gave MADRING something a drawing, simulation or construction inspection could not provide: 30 cars operating across two days while the people expected to run the event responded around them.
MADRING said officials activated race-control and track-control procedures, communication and signalling systems, marshal responses, recovery operations and coordination between resources around the circuit. Assistance and rescue crews responded when required, the organiser saying the track behaved as expected during the running. The two days therefore tested operations under live conditions. Circuit licensing asks whether the completed venue and its arrangements satisfy the requirements for the category of competition it will host. Appendix O allows several inspections during the development of a new project. Its fee structure provides for up to three inspections for a new circuit intended to host a Formula 1 World Championship round, with individual requirements determined by the project.
Reuters reported in June that two FIA inspection visits had already taken place and that another was scheduled for mid-August. MADRING said on 18 August that the track itself was completely finished, work continuing on grandstands, fan zones, hospitality areas, access routes and footbridges. A completed racing surface and an unfinished licensing process can coexist. Inspectors can assess safety installations, operational systems and final event preparations after the asphalt itself is complete.
MADRING also combines permanent infrastructure with sections using the surrounding road network. Appendix O defines permanent, semi-permanent and non-permanent circuits and applies different inspection timing to different types, but public material reviewed by R1V4L does not establish which timetable the FIA has formally applied to Madrid.
Nothing in the available material supports a claim that the Grand Prix is in danger. Formula 1 and the governing body continue to carry Madrid on the championship schedule, while organisers have moved from construction work to live operational testing. The unresolved point is narrower. Formula 3 demonstrated that MADRING could operate with cars on track while its sporting, medical, rescue and race-control systems were exercised. The public record still uses approval, homologation and testing to describe several different stages of the process.
The Spanish Grand Prix runs at MADRING from 11 to 13 September.
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