Trying Not to Fumble

How Formula 1 took a page from the NFL’s PR playbook

Image: Olivia Hicks

When Liberty Media acquired Formula One Group in 2017, its goal was to emulate the NFL’s business and sporting models.

From 2007 to 2016, nine different teams won the Super Bowl, including the New York Giants in 2008, who, in an upset, defeated the New England Patriots, the defending American Football Conference (AFC) champions the year prior.

American football, in Liberty Media’s eyes, was unpredictable. Any team could show up on “any given Sunday” to win a game or even a Super Bowl. 

By comparison, only three constructors had won world championships in F1 during that same 10-year span. At the end of the 2016 season, MRT Mercedes left the sport, unable to find a new buyer for the team, and Force India and Williams both struggled to turn profits. What’s more, ahead of the 2017 season, Vice reported that United Kingdom viewership of F1 had fallen to a 12-year low of 390 million viewers.

Inheriting what they saw as a predictable, financially unsustainable sport, Liberty Media made their expectations for Formula 1 clear: “Our goal is to build a long-term healthy ecosystem and build a sport that has much of the same elements that the NFL has on any given Sunday – that anybody can win,” Liberty Media CEO Greg Maffei said in an April 2023 investor call.

Liberty Media wanted to increase competitiveness, and sought to do so through the implementation of a cost cap, allowing smaller teams to have similar resources to legacy constructors; they wanted better racing and set in place 2023 regulations that would enhance a car’s ability to overtake another; they wanted to give fans access to drivers and created Netflix’s Drive to Survive to mirror the NFL’s expansive social media presence.

In some ways, these strategies worked: In the first three races of 2023, all teams scored at least one point, a first since the introduction of the new points system in 2010. At qualifying for the 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, the top eight drivers drove within a .487 second margin, the closest qualifying since 2012. 

In other ways, both F1 and the NFL have shown signs of recent struggle. Sports Illustrated reported in July 2023 that ABC lost 25 percent of its F1 viewership of the Miami Grand Prix broadcast compared to 2022. Buzz Radar found in a September 2023 case study that social media mentions of F1 hit 70.2 percent in the first five months of the year amidst a lack of title fights.

And despite NFL games making up 93 of the top 100 TV broadcasts last year, its public image — aside from its recent association with Taylor Swift — has faltered with evidence of racism (the NFL has three Black head coaches in a league with 32 teams made up of 58 percent Black players) and cover-ups of sexual violence (in 2021, quarterback Deshaun Watson quietly settled civil lawsuits from over two dozen women suing him for sexual harassment and sexual assault, and the Houston Texans enabled Watson by issuing non-disclosure agreements to some of the women with whom he met).

Meanwhile, F1 has come under recent criticism for its growing presence in the Gulf. In March 2023, over 20 UK Members of Parliament (MPs) expressed concerns over F1’s expansion to Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, which, according to the MPs, have “questionable human rights records,” including high rates of incarceration, particularly of political prisoners.

The two sporting industry giants are in the constant throes of preserving and evolving their brands internationally.

They’ve also demonstrated an interest in building a relationship beyond taking pages from PR playbooks. The mingling of the two sports, from athletes investing in teams to sharing venues, goes beyond wanting to build a mutual audience and overcome respective slumps with each other’s help. 

The bigger these two sports get, the more they rely on being immune to the controversies associated with their expansion.

Image: Olivia Hicks

Perks of a partnership

Though F1 may only race at the Miami International Autodrome surrounding the Hard Rock Stadium for one weekend out of the year, its presence is felt there year-round.

It’s hard to miss the 190,000-square-foot paddock complex overlooking the 3.36-mile race track on the perimeter of the Miami Dolphins stadium. Since the NFL team began hosting F1’s traveling circus in 2022, Dolphins owner Stephen J. Ross and CEO Tom Garfinkel have been intentional about deepening the connections between the two sports at Hard Rock Stadium. Garfinkel is part-owner of the Miami Grand Prix.

“The Miami Dolphins is our core business, obviously, it’s why we exist and why we’re here,” Garfinkel told The Athletic. “But the race is a very significant investment and a very significant business for us now.

Miami has been interested in growing itself as a sports epicenter for decades. The Hard Rock Stadium hosted the MLB World Series with the Miami Marlins in 1997 and 2003. Since 1984, they’ve hosted the Miami Open tennis tournament. In 2020, it hosted Super Bowl LIV, bringing in 4,500 new jobs to South Florida and an economic impact of $571 million, according to the Super Bowl Host Committee and Miami Beach commissions.

Finding the same success from the Miami Grand Prix two years later was more challenging. 

Organizers for the inaugural grand prix admit to having lost money after the 2022 event, which was deemed lackluster by drivers and fans. The 57-lap race was decidedly sleepy, and the fresh track’s rough tarmac was, according to Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, better suited for karts than F1 cars. 

But with a 10-year contract with F1, Miami course-corrected the next year, and in the process, increased the local NFL team’s presence at the event. Organizers decided to bring the paddock inside the stadium and construct the 190,000 square-foot, three-tiered Paddock Club building that would host 6,000 guests on the grand prix weekend.

Photo: Williams Racing via Instagram

At the 2023 Miami Grand Prix, players Tua Tagovailoa and Jaelen Phillips put drivers through fake combine training, with scores posted on the stadium’s leaderboard. Later, George Russell took Phillips along for hot laps in a Mercedes AMG GT-R supercar.

Sports outfitter Mitchell & Ness partnered with McLaren to create a line of jersey-style merch ahead of the Grand Prix weekend, a reprise of a similar line they launched ahead of the 2021 U.S. Grand Prix.

But after the May race, F1’s presence continued to be prominent at the Hard Rock Stadium.

Though the garages and pit areas have been emptied and used for hospitality, they still display signs with driver names and photos and contain a few F1 simulators. Inside the stadium, there are still photos of drivers and Dolphins players together. Dolphins season ticket owners will have access to a ticket package, with a section of the Turn 18 grandstand reserved for the football fans on the Grand Prix weekend.

The relationship between the NFL team and F1 has the opportunity to be symbiotic, Garfinkel believes, with the Dolphins bringing in new potential F1 fans, and European sports fans helping the NFL expand internationally.

The NFL goes globetrotting

In 2007, the NFL launched its International Series, a string of regular-season NFL games played overseas. The inaugural game between the New York Giants and Miami Dolphins brought over 81,000 fans to London’s Wembley Stadium.

Originally held exclusively at Wembley, the International Series had grown by 2016, expanding to Twickenham Stadium in London and Estadio Azteca in Mexico City. Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London hosted its first NFL game in 2019, and the series expanded to Germany in 2022, first to Munich’s Allianz Arena and then to Frankfurt’s Deutsche Bank Park, which hosted its first NFL game in 2023. Arena Corinthians in São Paulo, Brazil will hold its first International Series game later this year. The International Series is an expansion of the NFL’s American Bowl, an international pre-season game played from the 1986-2005 seasons.

The NFL announced in November 2023 that the International Series would have five total games. The sport is considering hosting an upcoming Super Bowl in London sometime after 2026.

The introduction and expansion of the International Series has been a definitive success. The 2022 Munich game where the Tampa Bay Buccaneers faced off against the Seattle Seahawks generated 70.2 million euros for the city. With 5.8 million U.S. viewers, according to the NFL Munich Game Impact Assessment study, it became the most-watched international NFL game.

 "The economic and social impact generated from our first regular season game is impressive and underlines the positive contribution the game had on the city of Munich and beyond, and we look ahead to playing future games in the country in the coming years."

The MLB and NBA have both expanded internationally, as well. The NBA has hosted its Global Games since 1978 (with McLaren driver Oscar Piasti attending an NBA Paris game on Jan. 11, 2024), and the MLB has played over 200 games across 11 countries over the past 30 years.

The expansion of the NFL across the pond and beyond is part of a larger effort to reach a $25 billion revenue goal by 2027.

The growth of American football across Europe is evidence of the European interest in the fanfare and flourishes of American sports. It’s a similar model that U.S. grands prix organizers are embodying with their focus on the fan experience.

F1’s earnest love of Americana has helped these efforts. 

Drivers such as Daniel Ricciardo, who has taken up a friendship with Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen, have provided inadvertent marketing for the NFL team. Ricciardo appeared in a December 2022 behind-the-scenes video on the Bills’ YouTube channel showing his experience at an NFL game. Most recently, Ricciardo posed for a picture with Lando Norris and fans at a burger restaurant in Australia in January 2024, with Ricciardo wearing the same Allen jersey.

Other drivers have taken their interest in the NFL a step further.

Team investments

Ahead of the 2022 NFL season, Lewis Hamilton joined the Walton-Penner Family Ownership Group, owners of the Denver Broncos who bought the team for $4.65 billion that same year. The group is helmed by Walmart heir Rob Walton.

Hamilton’s connections to the team ran deep before he became a minority owner. He hosted Broncos quarterback Russell Wilson and his wife Ciara at the 2018 Canadian Grand Prix and is friends with co-CEO of Ariel Investments and Starbucks chairperson Mellody Hobson. (After the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Hobson invited Hamilton to spend Christmas with her and her husband George Lucas.)

But the other driving factor for Hamilton to join the Broncos ownership was the team’s diversity and equity efforts. Hobson’s Ariel Investments is a Minority Business Enterprise investment company, meaning it is at least 51 percent owned by ethnic minority individuals in the U.S. The NFL has never had a team with a Black majority ownership, and Hobson’s presence on the Broncos’ ownership team — as well as former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s minority ownership — was a statement of intent from the Broncos on increasing Black leadership within the sport.

"I also want to acknowledge the bond that I have with the players, who like me, have had to overcome a lot in their lives, and I know the amount of focus and discipline it has taken for them to get here," Hobson said at an August 2022 press conference announcing her partial ownership.

Hamilton’s own desire to increase equity in motorsport through the Hamilton Commission and Mission 44, aligned with the values of the team, though the DEI efforts within NFL minority ownership will likely remain a performative drop in the bucket.

But DEI commitments aside, Hamilton also brought clout to the Broncos. After attending a Dec. 10, 2023 game against the Los Angeles Chargers, Hamilton’s Instagram post of himself wandering through SoFi stadium in a Broncos jacket racked up nearly 700,000 likes.

The interest in team ownership goes both ways. 

Photo: Alpine via Instagram

In October 2023, Super Bowl defending champions Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and tight end Travis Kelce became the latest stakeholders of Alpine F1 Team.

Private investment firm Otro Capital announced in June a $218 million investment in the team, a 24 percent stake. The group includes actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, who helped transform Wrexham AFC with a $2.5 million investment in 2020, as well as golfer Rory McIlroy, heavyweight boxer Anthony Joshua and footballers Trent Alexander-Arnold and Juan Mata.

“I think everybody can see the appeal," Mahomes said after the ownership announcement. "I've been able to get to a couple races now, seeing the environment, and then obviously watching Drive to Survive on Netflix you see how competitive it is.”

A pet project for the NFL stars, their investment has the opportunity to transform an ailing Alpine team. 

2023 saw an extensive turnover of leadership within the French team, with CEO  Laurent Rossi being replaced in July by Philippe Krief. Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer and Sporting Director Alan Permane left a few weeks later after the Belgian Grand Prix, and Chief Technical Officer Pat Fry left at the end of the season to join Williams. Alpine also fell to P6 in the 2023 constructors’ standings after finishing P4 the year prior.

It remains to be seen how the investment will impact Alpine in the coming years. After Reynolds’ and McElhenney’s investment in Wrexham, they were credited with helping the team advance to the English Football League in April. Their FX docuseries “Welcome to Wrexham” publicized the team’s journey.

Superficial efforts get serious

The bottom line of all these efforts is obviously to grow the respective sports and to do that, there’s a focus on exposure and growing audiences through the investment in fan-centric experiences and novelty, a return to the ethos Liberty Media is borrowing from the NFL to enhance F1.

Beyond the NFL and F1’s desire for a shared audience is the shared need for growth, or at the very least, survival.

At the beginning of the 2022 NFL season, New York magazine editor Will Leitch meditated on how the league has been able to continue to enthrall audiences despite recent setbacks and controversies.

“It has made its mission to be all things to all people, like Coca-Cola or Chevrolet,” he wrote. “And it has succeeded magnificently.”

An American football game is the ultimate form of escape, he argues. By evading pushy questions about scandals and lawsuits and employing a too-big-to-fail attitude, the NFL has been able to rely on audiences simply forgetting about or overlooking their misgivings to return to simply watching football. As the NFL becomes more institutionalized — expanding to Europe and working to add eight more teams to the league by 2034 — it becomes easier for them to bulldoze over dissenters.

Formula One Group appears to be taking a similar approach: At the 2022 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, despite missiles and drones hitting an Aramco oil depot near Jeddah about 10 miles from the circuit, F1 CEO Stefano Domincali and team principals insisted the event go on as planned.

McLaren quietly announced in December 2023 that Bahrain's sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat will take full ownership of McLaren Group, of which the F1 team is a subsidiary. Since the announcement, McLaren has continued their online branding strategy of highlighting driver personalities and western brand partnerships. The week of the ownership announcement, the team’s social media accounts pushed the usual Christmas content, and on Jan. 11, McLaren’s Extreme E team announced a NEOM McLaren XE ODYSSEY 21 Lego product, a companion to the F1 Lego Technic released in 2022. With a churning content mill, it was easy for McLaren to bury connections to the Gulf’s alleged “sportswashing.”

None of the above connections between the NFL and F1 will be the panacea to helping the other survive. Many are superficial or self-indulgent. But they do serve to help each sport expand their reach and broaden their institution, ultimately helping the other preserve their too-big-to-fail status.