Earlier start for F1 races after Bianchi crash

PARIS - Agence France-Presse

Lotus F1 team driver Pastor Maldonado goes off the track after colliding with Sauber driver Esteban Guitiererrez during the British Grand Prix at the Silverstone Race Circuit, central England, in this July 6, 2014 file photo. REUTERS Photo

Formula One organisers the FIA on Jan. 20 announced earlier starts for five grand prix this season, the move introduced as one of the recommendations after Jules Bianchi's near-fatal crash.
      
The 25-year-old Frenchman was left fighting for his life when his Marussia car ploughed into a recovery vehicle at the Japanese Grand Prix last October.
      
The accident in wet conditions with the light fading led to a major safety review.
      
Races in Australia, Malaysia, China, Japan and Russia have all been brought forward with organisers ruling that no grand prix should start within four hours of sunset to avoid the kind of conditions that Bianchi faced at Suzuka.
      
The three floodlit evening races in Bahrain, Singapore and Abu Dhabi remain unchanged.         Bianchi lost control of his car at 126kph on the 43rd lap at a rain-drenched circuit and smashed into a mobile crane removing Adrian Sutil's Sauber car at the time.
      
In November, Bianchi was brought out of an artificial coma and flown back to France to a hospital in Nice where the last official update from his family on December 30 reported that he was "unconscious but able to breathe without assistance".