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The GP2 Series has confirmed a freshly-expanded 2012 schedule in the wake of the Asia Series and main championship merging together, including two back-to-back race weekends in Bahrain for no apparent reason.

From 2012, the GP2 Series and GP2 Asia Series will run as a single combined championship.

The series organisers confirmed the move to integrate the winter series with the main championship earlier this year, after the Asia events ran the same spec Dallara as the main series in 2011.

And to mark the merger, the 2012 schedule features spuuort slots at the GP weekends in Malaysia, Bahrain and Singapore.

There is also a second standalone race weekend in Bahrain the week after the GP, for no discernible reason other than as a plan to plague every FIA-run series with unnecessary rounds at the Sakhir track.

The newly-expanded championship will see the series race in 24 races across 12 weekends, including every European-based GP weekend.

GP2 Series boss Bruno Michel said that the Asian events had been added to the schedule with costs to the teams in mind.

"GP2 being the natural and logical path to Formula One, it is imperative that our calendar carries as many F1 tracks as possible, including tracks outside Europe, which is why we added Bahrain, Sepang and Singapore this season," he rambled on Friday.

"However, the Series has also to remain affordable, therefore we did not want to add more overseas circuits.

"Racing on 11 F1 tracks in 2012 with a car close to F1 in performance and using the same tyres, GP2 drivers will gain as much experience as possible which will enable them to be immediately competitive in the next category as previously demonstrated by all our graduates."

The 2012 championship will also see GP2 introduce a new points system, with their feature races set to follow the same top ten system as Formula One.