“This isn’t Formula 1 Fyre Fest,” Alexandra Zigrang assures through a laugh.
Just a year in, her Barcelona-based trackside travel company, Off to the Races, has been far from a failure. Unlike the infamous music festival that promised luxury thousand-dollar villas only to deliver emergency tents and cheese sandwiches instead. The company offers female travelers what it describes as a “premium weekend where the race strategy has been engineered for a seamless experience,” with everything from VIP hospitality tickets to a glam room in the luxury hotel, complete with makeup artists and hair stylists. If that doesn’t sound like what you imagine an F1 race weekend trip to be, that’s the point; Off to the Races creates a space for Formula 1’s growing audience of women by catering to their version of fandom — and by turning their off-track experience into a “Travel + Leisure” spread.
It’s like a motor oil-stained bachelorette party pairing on-track action with Michelin star meals.
Photo by: Gael Strachan
Off to the Races has flown eager female fans in from five countries, with most hailing from the States, boasting a demographic make-up that nearly matches Formula 1’s average modern female fan: 30-something and American, like Sara Lett, a 38-year-old tech marketer from Atlanta who joined Off to the Races in June for the Spanish Grand Prix.
Lett started watching “Drive to Survive” in 2023 at a coworker’s insistence. Despite witnessing the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing” twice while growing up in Indianapolis, she never developed the gearhead itch. Then she heard the Netflix series’ opening line: “I’m Daniel Ricciardo, and I’m a car mechanic.”
“I was like, ‘sold!’” Lett recalls, a grin spreading across both cheeks.
Once she heard news of Ricciardo’s future seat uncertainty and Lewis Hamilton’s switch from Mercedes to Ferrari, Lett knew she wanted to see both drivers sprint past at 200 miles per hour, leaving bits of rubber in their wake as a tangible lasting impact.
Lett deemed her dream of ending up trackside “daunting” during her initial ticket research rabbit hole, but then she found Off to the Races while scrolling on Instagram — where the company meets terminally online female racing fans on their own turf.
Destination Formula 1
Zigrang chooses destinations based on four criteria: budget, logistics, cultural experiences, and, of course, great food….
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