US GP ticket sales ‘took off’ after Max Verstappen stopped winning
Sign up now: Get the biggest sports news in your inbox
Dutch driver Max Verstappen of Red Bull racing during the Singapore Grand Prix, on Sept 22.
ST PHOTO: SHINTARO TAY
Follow topic:
LONDON – Ticket sales for October’s Formula One United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas, “took off” after Max Verstappen stopped winning, according to race promoter Bobby Epstein.
Red Bull’s Verstappen started the season in dominant fashion, winning four of the first five races and seemingly set to wrap up his fourth drivers’ title well before the end of the campaign.
But the Dutch 27-year-old, who won 19 of 22 races last season, has failed to win any of the last eight, with McLaren’s Lando Norris his closest challenger and now 52 points behind with six rounds remaining.
“Our ticket sales really took off when Max stopped winning, and it got more competitive,” Epstein, whose Circuit of the Americas hosts a sprint race weekend on Oct 19-20, told reporters.
The promoter had feared a “weakest year in four since the pandemic” but said there had instead been a “hockey stick” effect of sales trending upwards.
The US Grand Prix will also be the first since Red Bull-owned RB dropped Australian Daniel Ricciardo, a big favourite of the US crowd, in September and replaced him with New Zealander Liam Lawson.
Epstein hoped Ricciardo might still attend in some other role, saying: “I’m not sure necessarily people are buying tickets to come see him race if he’s not in a competitive car, right?
“If you’re coming, though, because he’s part of the F1 community, I think he can still be part of the F1 community in a pretty meaningful way. And he’s really, really loved in Texas, and I think he likes it here.
“I hope he’s still coming here because we’ve got a lot of people that would love to shake his hand or get his autograph or take a picture or just see him around town. We’ll keep him busy.”
The circuit will be hosting an Eminem concert after the Saturday sprint and Epstein expects a crowd of 130,000 to 150,000 on that day alone.
There will also be a college football game in town on the Saturday between the Texas Longhorns and the Georgia Bulldogs, a heavyweight clash that has sent hotel prices soaring in the state capital.
“I think we’ll have a weekend like we’ve never had before in terms of overall excitement and things to do,” added Epstein. “The fact that we’ve got the top-ranked college game happening on that Saturday is going to make for an amazing weekend.”
In other F1 news, the sport will not hold a sprint race for rookie drivers in Abu Dhabi after the final grand prix of the season, the governing FIA said on Oct 2.
The concept has been discussed for some time but stakeholders decided at a meeting of the Formula One commission at the RB team’s factory in Faenza, Italy, not to proceed.
“While the concept received widespread support, it was determined that due to timing and organisational constraints, the event would not take place in 2024,” the FIA said in a statement.
“Discussions will continue to formulate a potential concept and plan for 2025.”
The last grand prix of the season is at Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina on Dec 8.
The sprint format, with qualifying and a 100km race on the same day, would give potentially 10 rookie drivers the chance to compete against one another in current cars without teams worrying about damage.
Also on Oct 2, French luxury goods giant LVMH announced a 10-year sponsorship deal as a global partner of F1.
The multinational company – based in Paris like F1’s governing body the FIA – is best known for brands like Louis Vuitton, Moet Hennessy and Tag Heuer.
The link-up with F1, estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars, comes on the back of its close sponsorship with the Paris Olympics and Paralympics.
LVMH, owned by one of the world’s richest men Bernard Arnault, joins F1‘s other main sponsors like DHL, Heineken, MSC Croisieres, Pirelli and Qatar Airways. REUTERS, AFP
