What Miami F1 spectacle will and won’t change for British GP

For F1’s owner Liberty Media it was a delight to see, as it delivered further proof that its bid to break the American market is paying off.

Off the back of it, there were also several comments about how the razzmatazz of it all would act as a wake-up call for other circuits to need to lift their game if they were not going to get left behind.

As McLaren CEO Zak Brown said ahead of the Miami weekend: “I think Miami is going to raise the bar for everyone.”

But for all the success of the Miami weekend, there is no denying that its target audience and what it was able to offer, were something that does not fit in all markets.

A fake Marina would be straight up weird stuck on the outside of Eau Route at Spa, and having mermaids wagging their tails in a pool would be completely out of place at Monza.

However, some important lessons can be taken away from the event, and current race promoters are well aware that pulling off a successful grand prix event nowadays is more than just about the offerings of F1 track action for a few hours each day.

That is why British Grand Prix boss Stuart Pringle was an interested observer of all that was going on in Miami as he continues his quest to make his Silverstone race bigger and better than ever.

He is quite right that transposing the Miami model in to rural Northamptonshire would not work.

“We are certainly two very different events,” he tells Autosport. “Would our fan base get on with this type of event? I don’t think they would.

“So I don’t feel it puts pressure on us, but I think it’s given us a degree of sharpness to my focus of where I want to take the British Grand Prix over this next period.”

While Pringle’s plan does not involve a fake marina (Silverstone already has a small lake down by Club), Pringle is clear that there are two key takeaways from the Miami GP: one of which it did well and one it didn’t.

Chief of these is in doing what Miami…