Red Bull Formula 1 team principal Christian Horner admits the cancellation of the season-opening Australia⛦n Grand Prix due to the coronavirus outbreak was “frustrating”.

F1 called off its season-op🌄ener in Melbourne following an outbreak of COVID-19 in the paddock, with a member of the McLaren team contracting the flu-like disease.

After a meeting held by teams and F1 officials on Thursday night, it was announced 🦩that the opening round had been abandoned less than two hours before the scheduled start of free practice.

“It’s obviously frustrating,” 🍌Horner said🍌. “The situation globally is changing hour-by-hour and day-by-day.

“When we arrived in Australia the🌟 intention was to go racing but unfortunately following the positive test of a person within the paddock the decision was made to cancel thไe event.

“Ultimately the safety and wellbeingꦛ of staff, th🐟e fans and the paddock is hugely important.”

Red Bu🌺ll was among the teams in favour of going ahead with the race, but it is understood that after a 5-5 tie in a team vote, Mercedes changed its viewpoint and subsequently sent a letter to F1 and the FIA to request the cancellation of the even🐬t, ultimately setting off a chain of events that led to it being called off.

“We were minded to monitor the situation,” he explained🎶. “The local health authority was giving the go-ahead for the eve🃏nt, the FIA were giving the go-ahead.

“There was a maꦐjority that we🌃re in favour of running and doing more screening today in the event of any more outbreaks.

“That obviously changed following the meeting with teams changing position so the🍸 promoter had no choice but to cancel the event.”

F1 has also called off planned upcoming races in Bahrain and Vietna♎m, adding to the already postponed Chinese Grand Prix.

There are major doubts over whether the Dutch and Spanish gran🥃ds prix in May will be able to be𓆉 staged, with the season now expected to start at the end of May at the earliest.