Carey: 2018 F1 calendar intended to be final

Next year's calendar was released on Monday following a meeting of the World Motor Sport Council in Geneva, marking an early first draft compared to previous seasons. There are still two races marked as subject to confirmation – China and Singapore – that are without contracts, but Carey says plenty of discussions were held to reach the current schedule.

Speaking at the FIA Sport Conference in Geneva, when it was put to Carey that last season saw multiple calendar tweaks and changes before final approval, he replied: "I wasn't there last year so I actually don't know about the four calendars [last year].

"This is very much our expectation that this is going to be the calendar, but again, we put the asterisk to be clear, at full disclosure on where we are in the process. But we wouldn't have put the calendar out, we wouldn't have submitted it, if it wasn't the calendar we planned to move forward with.

"We've had discussions with all the relevant parties. This isn't like putting it out and now waiting for everybody to react. We've engaged, we got feedback, so I think the parties that are most directly affected by it... again, this didn't come out as a surprise."

Carey explained both China and Singapore are in the final year of their respective contracts but he is pleased with the progress being made in discussions over an extension.

"Our expectation and goal is to have a race. We're engaged with them. The reason is the contracts were up this year, so we're negotiating new agreements, so those agreements aren't completed. We're having good discussions and our expectation is to have it, but obviously we don't have a signed agreement, so it's just a reality of life with a lead time that still exists.

"We haven't even had this year's Singapore race, let alone next year's, so it's just the reality of having agreements that have come up. We're negotiating new agreements, we're having good, constructive discussions and expect to get there, but we want it to be accurate.

"We don't expect it to be 19 [races], we expect it to be 21. We wouldn't have put it out if we didn't expect it to be 21, but the reality is we don't have a completed agreement."