It will soon be known – there will be no Formula 1 World Championship round in Miami in 2019. The new sports management wants to prevent a disgrace like the planned Grand Prix across from New York.
Recently it was leaked: A committee of the Miami city government will not deal with the plans for a Formula 1 World Cup in Miami until September – after the summer vacation. It’s too late to schedule the race for October 2019. In Hockenheim, the Formula 1 leadership can hear: Miami is on hold, the Grand Prix in the US metropolis will be held in October 2020. (There was already Grands Prix in Miami for sports cars and IndyCars, but not for Formula 1.)
There was considerable resistance to the planned race. The city takes citizens’ concerns seriously and wants to do their homework thoroughly. At the same time, the Miami GP is a prestige project for the Formula 1 leadership around Liberty Media: the first World Cup run that the Americans negotiate themselves, after the Bernie Ecclestone era. Liberty Media cannot afford a disgrace like Bernie Ecclestone’s with New York.
For years, Formula 1 promoter Ecclestone had tried to organize a world championship run in the most famous city in the world, New York. He bit granite. A “Grand Prix of America” with the Manhattan skyline in the background appeared in makeshift Formula 1 World Cup calendars for two years, but the planned race had to be postponed again and again – because the funding did not materialize.
In August 2013, Ecclestone said: “You have a valid contract. If they meet the conditions, then we’ll drive too. We want this Grand Prix. We’ve tinkered with it long enough, we’ve made enough compromises. We even sent them ten million to plug a few holes and keep all doors open. We are serious about this race. “
A Grand Prix on the “Port Imperial Street Course” of New Jersey, officially the “Grand Prix of America”, but only called the New York GP, appeared in the 2013 and 2014 World Cup program. We never got to see a race, as much as the American businessman Leo Hindery jr. also tried to get funding.
Formula 1 CEO Chase Carey: “We want to develop America into a really large Formula 1 market. Formula 1 is a premium brand, so you have to go to the big cities – Los Angeles, New York or Miami. “
Of all these plans, Miami has come the furthest, plans for Las Vegas are ready to go in the drawer, New York has not been forgotten by Liberty Media.
What will take place in Miami in 2019: A fan festival in the week before the US Grand Prix in Austin / Texas (October 21).
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