Las Vegas GP 'clown' show may kill F1 progress as long-time fans' wishes ignored
A different American city - the same pomp and pageantry which blighted proceedings in Miami.
The Las Vegas Grand Prix weekend officially began on Wednesday with a 30-minute opening ceremony. If you didn't catch it, think of the quadrennial show to kick off the Olympic Games but smaller, shorter and much, much more pointless.
For starters, it happened 72 hours before the actual race. The WWE-style ceremony introducing all 20 drivers to the crowd at the Miami Grand Prix earlier this year was painful enough, but at least it happened just before the action began and so served a purpose.
Most of the drivers hated that too but participated nonetheless. And the same was true in Las Vegas as they were all presented like livestock to the crowd on the pit straight off the new street track, the construction of which has infuriated pretty much every resident and business owner within a large radius.
Not that many of them enjoyed it. As Lance Stroll pointed out, they're "not Hollywood stars". Max Verstappen was more blunt when he declared he felt like "a clown" and dead right when he dubbed this whole weekend "99 per cent show, and one per cent sporting event".
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Defending F1's corner has been Lewis Hamilton, who spoke highly of the Miami mess and came out in support of the Vegas race too. "I hear there's a lot of people complaining about the direction that Stefano [Domenicali, F1 chief executive] and Liberty have been going, but I think they've been doing an amazing job."
Sorry Lewis, here comes some complaining. But it's because of genuine concern for the sport's future. These moves to build more hype and keep the attention of F1's new generation of fans for more than a few seconds come at the risk of alienating the sport's core support.
That could be of huge detriment to F1's future. Liberty Media and Domenicali have to be applauded for the steps they have taken in recent years to grow the popularity of the sport the world over. It has arguably never been more healthy and it makes complete sense that chiefs are cashing in on that. Make hay while the sun shines, as they say.
And the growth figures are impressive. Nielsen data suggests one in three F1 fans started following the sport in the last four years, while F1 enjoyed faster digital followers growth than any other sport in 2022. In the US, average TV viewership is up while three of the four largest ever live race audiences were recorded this year – in a season with no title intrigue whatsoever.
But for how long is the sun going to shine? For how long at those new fans brought into F1 by Drive to Survive and that 2021 title battle between Verstappen and Hamilton going to remain interested? If one team keeps winning as easily as Red Bull have this year, it's easy to see many of the fair-weather fans switching off.
However, if F1 alienates its core support in the meantime, what will it be left with if those newer fans do lose interest? That is what the sport must bear in mind. Clearly, by the fact that these off-putting stunts keep getting the green light, it hasn't been considered nearly enough.
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