Miami encapsulates the new path F1 is taking

Miami is the best example of what Formula 1 is today and where the future is heading in the short and medium term. Everyone wins, organisers above all, and the races don’t lose too much, which is what fans and drivers want. But the show is fattening on all sides.

The Grand Prix of Miami is a resounding success without being the best circuit, nor the best weather, nor the best stage for the VIPs, but it’s all sold out.

6000 of those VIPs have paid 12,000 euros per head (four times more than Azerbaijan), when last year they received a treatment unworthy of those tickets: just popcorn and hamburgers to eat, with hot water.

But there were no deep complaints. Nor about the traffic jams inside the track or the collapsed bridges: they’ve sold out again. They’ve widened those bridges a bit and changed caterers to eat what they pay for.

In fact, there is still a select group of VIPs, who are taken inside the circuit, even occupying spaces previously sacred to photographers, who shoo them away like flies, and end up watching the race on the wall.

Few complaints, quick solutions

The drivers and teams did complain that the ‘paddock’, that space where drivers, VIPs, sometimes some of the public, press and sponsors meet, was narrow and uncomfortable.

The solution was to put these hospitality facilities inside the Hard Rock Stadium. There is plenty of space, the guests and celebrities have time and space to meet the drivers, and everyone is happy.

Artificial turf and fake boats are only criticised from the outside. Here, the aerial panorama is sensational, as in Baku or Jeddah, which, with the light of the fountains and the drones in focus, look like scenes from the Arabian Nights.

That’s where F1 is going, to more people, with big urban spaces, spectacular views across the city’s nerve centres, people coming and going, enjoying, as in Miami, more of the show than the racing, the atmosphere and not the DRS.

Vin Diesel, the actor, strolling around and filming a scene for his latest movie and maybe Brad Pitt drops by. The music and concerts, the bars nearby, the fan zones, the games and attractions, and at the end of the day, the racing. Whether Max Verstappen likes it or not, he has become a champion of the classics.