No plan to cancel F1 races, says FIA

Formula One's ruling body plans to go ahead with the season's three remaining races in the wake of Tuesday's terror attacks in New York and Washington.

"There is no plan to cancel the future grands prix," International Automobile Federation (FIA) spokeswoman Agnes Kaiser said on Wednesday.

She was speaking at Monza where final preparations were being made for Sunday's Italian Grand Prix.

The FIA would not add to the carefully-worded phrase, which did not say definitively that the races -- one of them the U.S. Grand Prix at Indianapolis in two weeks' time -- would go ahead.

Nor did it appear to rule out any possible rescheduling. The final race is set for Suzuka in Japan on October 14.

In order for Indianapolis to go ahead as planned on September 30, cars would have to be air freighted out to the United States a week earlier.

The Italian Grand Prix had been the subject of speculation about whether or not it would go ahead following the postponement earlier in the day of European soccer matches.

An editorial on the front page of Wednesday's Gazzetta dello Sport newspaper criticised UEFA for not cancelling matches on Tuesday night but did not mention the grand prix.

New York has a considerable Italian-American population, from the mayor down, and many Italians have family ties with the United States.

Formula One teams waited for FIA president Max Mosley to return to Europe from a visit to Peru and continued to plan as normal, assuming the race would be on unless told otherwise.

Technicians worked on setting up the paddock at Monza on Wednesday and mechanics and other team personnel flew in as scheduled.

However, Ferrari's world champion Michael Schumacher called off a planned charity soccer match he had been due to play on Thursday night.