Formula 1’s calendar might be in the middle of an uncharacteristically quiet spell right now, but both for the sport and its next destination, this is just the calm before the storm.
In two weeks, the United States Grand Prix will kick off a run of six races in eight weeks to round off the season, with a genuine title fight starting to shape up as Lando Norris continues to close in on Max Verstappen.
The very nature of that battle has taken a fascinating twist as the year has unfolded, with Verstappen dominating early on, winning seven of the first 10 races and finishing second – with a Sprint race victory – in Miami. But that same weekend marked the start of a McLaren resurgence, and Norris has started adding regular wins of his own to ignite the battle in a way that has had an impact on Circuit of the Americas (COTA).
“I think we’re in good shape coming up to this grand prix, although the route to get here was a little bit different this year from a fan standpoint, in that our ticket sales really took off when Max stopped winning, and it got more competitive,” Epstein says.
“So I give a lot of credit to our fan base and the audience, and that they really are tuned in, they are educated and and they’re paying attention. And I think it’s exciting to see the season shape up the way it is.
“We’re expecting another big crowd, probably it’s somewhere in [the region of] where it’s been the last couple years. I would think whatever the record is for a Saturday Sprint race, we should shatter that record because Eminem has outsold Taylor Swift, and we’ve increased the size of the infield lawn to get to near 100,000 for the concert.
“I think whatever amount people they’ve had on Sprint races before, 130-to-150,000 people will be there for this year’s Saturday Sprint race, and it’s going to be an incredible Saturday. We think it is the biggest weekend ever for sports entertainment, and we’re billing it as such.
“The Longhorns, our little local team, are ranked up in the country, and it’s Texas against Georgia. And so there’s going to be a lot of people in town for that. So if you like racing and football and music and good time, Austin is going to be an unbelievable place to be.
“I think we’ll have a weekend like we’ve never had before, in terms of overall excitement and things to do. The fact that we’ve got a top-ranked college game happening on that Saturday is going to make for an amazing weekend. And we’re probably setting a record on Austin hotel prices! So hopefully some of that trickles over to San Antonio. But we’re ready, and the place looks good.”
Epstein certainly isn’t joking when it comes to hotel prices, and having a college football game taking place in downtown Austin on the same weekend as one of the biggest grand prix events on the calendar is a logistical challenge in itself.
Knowing that there will be groups specifically making their way to the Texas capital for one or the other sport, COTA has offered a special ‘Football Package’ that allows fans to have F1 tickets specifically for Friday and Sunday – freeing them up for Saturday’s game at a lower price than if they had bought individual day passes.
“The football package really is just something fun we came up with a couple weeks ago because Saturday was selling out largely because of Eminem, and we still have capacity on Sunday, and certainly have it on Friday.
“So we just said, let’s throw it out there for people… It’s not because we were suffering on our Saturday sales, right? Saturday’s the football day, and that’s the one we’ve largely got sold out, because it offers both the racing and the concert.
“But we just thought it’d be fun. I think most of the hotels are three or four night minimums. So if you’re a Georgia fan coming in for it, you say, ‘what else am I going do the rest of the weekend?’ Well, you can buy Friday and Sunday, come out to the track.”
Many sports fans might have seen the double-header coming when the dates were agreed, but at that time nobody knew that the Longhorns were going to start 5-0. Even if they could have predicted that, they would have been hard-pushed to suggest Verstappen would be arriving off the back of an 0-8 run in race wins since the Spanish Grand Prix in June.
The majority of teams will be bringing upgrades to COTA ahead of the final push, and Red Bull will hope to stop the rot to allow Verstappen a smooth route to a fourth consecutive drivers’ title. Should it fail to do so, then Norris could well be in a position to take the fight all the way to the wire.
With the Longhorns looking to hold onto their ranking as one of the country’s top teams, having both hooks means Epstein is seeing a chance for football fans to discover F1, and F1 fans – particularly international travelers – to get swept up in the college football scene.
“We have wound up on the same weekend as college football games before, which is makes for fun downtown, late-night,” he says. “We know experience in Austin, but I don’t think we’ve had it where the Longhorns have been ranked as high.
“It’s a chance twofold. One for the college football fan who, if they’re going to a college football game as big as this, they like sports and they like big events. So if that’s part of your vernacular, then you’re gonna like to make your weekend even bigger, and you’re going to add on F1 Sunday.
“And in fact, you don’t have to compromise. If you’ve got the energy, you can go to the game on Saturday and go to F1 if the game time kickoff is in the evening. You can go to Eminem for an hour and something, and then make the second half of the football game, which we know some people are planning on doing, because the shuttle stop for our buses, our downtown bus route goes right by and drops off very near the stadium.
“So I know there’s plenty of people planning to go first half of the concert and then go to the second half of the football game. But it’s a great opportunity for those fans.
“Then also for our fans who come for F1 who are event fans. I know the Europeans are particularly fond of college football, in particular the halftime show. It’s surprising, but we have groups from Europe that come when there is a college football game because it adds to their weekend, and they in particular like the marching band halftime shows.
“It’s something we may take for granted here, but the pomp and circumstance and all the fun around a college football atmosphere is something that’s so uniquely American that we know our out-of-country visitors like that, and look for that on the weekend to just elevate the experience overall.”
The Longhorns might have dropped to the No.2 seed this past week, and Norris still has a fortnight to wait before trying to continue putting the pressure on Verstappen, but Austin is guaranteed to have two huge events creating a special weekend. And from an F1 perspective, it could prove to be central to its hopes of a final round showdown.