Two championships are done and dusted and so it is to a new circuit that we turn our attention for this weekend's excitement. With plenty of unknowns for the coming sessions, teams and drivers will have to work extra hard if they want to get a good result. That means great interest for us at home! There's been a lot of buzz around this new race, and it will be fascinating to see if it can deliver, or if there is still work that needs to be done.

Event schedule

I find it interesting that Korea has been on the calendar for two years now and still has no circuit in existence on Google maps. India is showing up for it's very first one, so it's already one step ahead. This weekend, we're seeing the home race for a few people. Narain Karthikeyan has been granted a seat at HRT, replacing Tonio Liuzzi for the weekend. Karun Chandhok was not quite so lucky over at Team Lotus, but he's been doing interview after interview regardless.

Meanwhile, Force India have been looking forward to this weekend for the majority of the year, and will be keen to keep finishing well to stay ahead of Sauber in the constructor's championship.

At the front, Lewis Hamilton may be feeling revitalised, if his last race is anything to go by. We know that Red Bull are actually beatable in qualifying, and now it's just a matter of repeating the feat in the race. With just simulator practice behind them, it could be anyone's weekend.

Note: In the UK, the session times are on the half hour rather than on the more traditional hour. Also daylight savings ends at 2am on Sunday morning, meaning the race time is back to good old GMT.

Support racing for this event includes JK Racing Asia Series and Delhi Championship with MRF.

The weather

You can never rely upon the long range weather forecasts for 100% accuracy but they usually give a good overview of what is coming up. And what is coming up this weekend looks to be complete and utter sunshine.

Circuit map

The circuit

The circuit is designed by Hermann Tilke who certainly has experience of creating Formula 1 tracks, even if he doesn't always seem to do it with the best of racing in mind. For this particular circuit, he consulted with the teams before putting the design in place, and it looks to be better for it. Unsually for a new track, there are plenty of elevation changes, with a hill of 14 metres covering the first few corners.

Other facts and figures are unknown, but the top speed is expected to be somewhere between 320kph, which can be reached on the super lengthy straight - the longest part of the track being 1060 metres.

Tyre compounds

Press conference schedule

Official press conferences are organised by the FIA and happen four times during the weekend. The qualifying and post race press conferences will take place after the television unilateral interviews.

Race stewards

The FIA stewarding process was changed last year to include a former F1 driver to give added insight. These are the stewards overseeing this weekend's action.