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Laurence Edmondson, F1 Editor
Formula One CEO Stefano Domenicali is adamant Max Verstappen’s continued domination of the sport will not impact its popularity in the United States, and has ruled out “WWE”-style intervention to mix up the order.
In the past five years, F1 has experienced rapid growth in the U.S. with average television viewing figures more than doubling between 2018 and 2023.
– ESPN’s Unlapped Podcast: Is this the best Max Verstappen has ever been?
The sport’s boom has largely been attributed to the success of the Netflix docu-series “Drive to Survive” combined with F1’s increased efforts to market the sport in the U.S., but the growth was also turbocharged by the intense title battle between Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton for the 2021 title that went down to the final lap of the season.
Since then, F1 has been much more one sided, and in the case of 2023 and 2024 almost have been almost entirely dominated by Verstappen and Red Bull.
The lack of competition has led to concerns that American fans might switch off, but Domenicali argued the opposite in an interview with ESPN.
“I tell you why, because we need to create legends in all sports,” Domenicali said. “If you change too many winners, people do not capture the significance of being so strong.
“And the element of being strong has always been a part of Formula One, it is a cyclical sport when it comes to success.
“In the U.S. you have for many years the same team or same athlete winning and then you have iconic players and iconic teams, so for that I don’t think it is negative.
“For sure, if you ask me my personal opinion I would like to have exciting action on the track, and this is happening. For now, Max is the strongest with the best car, for sure, but I am not so worried about it because it is part of the nature of the sport.”
Domenicali ruled out the possibility of F1 attempting to change the rules to make the sport more competitive. Upcoming engine and chassis regulation changes in 2026 could see the competitive order upended, but F1’s CEO said it will not be as a result of a targeted intervention to hold one team back.
“[This is] what we cannot have, we are not WWE,” he added. “With a lot of respect to WWE, our fights on the track have to be real.
“And what we have to make sure is that around this we have the right entertainment platform to create the right vibes for what we are doing, but on the track we want to be real. That’s for sure.”
Domenicali, who became F1 CEO at the start of 2021, believes the sport’s growth in the U.S. is down to efforts to communicate to a wider audience about more than just racing.
Before owners Liberty Media bought the sport in 2017, Domenicali said F1’s approach to marketing in the U.S. had been “arrogant” as it focused solely on a single race in the country each year.
However, he believes continued efforts to connect with U.S.-based fans, including an upcoming F1 movie produced by Apple and starring Brad Pitt, will see F1’s growth in the country continue.
“Of course, what happened with Liberty coming in, there was a change of approach in general in the sport. Considering the racing itself, which is of course the centre of our product, but with the objective to try to communicate with everyone using a different form of communication.
“That’s why we opened up our social media, that’s why there was a project within our marketing group to discuss in a different way the values of Formula One, and that’s the reason why there was a project like Drive to Survive, which contributed for sure to getting in the public domain at a different level.
“That’s why we have continued this — that’s why we are doing other projects like the movie with Apple, with a big Hollywood producer and director — because we think that is the only way to capture the attention of market, not only from a sporting point of view, but in general, they are very focused on their products.
“So the fact that we were able to move from only one grand prix that was in Austin four years ago to three grands prix today, all full and with great success, means that we have achieved the first step of our growth in the U.S. in terms of increasing awareness.
“But America is huge. As a potential growth there is a lot of space for us to keep working and that is why we don’t want to stop.”
Asked if F1 can continue to grow at the same rate in the U.S. over the next five years, Domenicali added: “I really hope the growth will continue to be like, and this is our objective.
“It is not only the U.S., the world is our objective. Of course, the U.S. will represent for us a big possibility to grow in terms of the quality of what we can offer, and I do believe that the potential to be here in five years time together and see the next step of our growth will happen.
“There are a lot of elements that we still need to tackle because we didn’t have the time or we didn’t have the resources, which would lead us to that growth.”