By Joshua Robinson
A decade ago, it was a sunbaked parking lot.
Sprawling out in all directions from the home of the NFL's Miami Dolphins, it sat mostly empty, outside of eight or nine tailgating weekends and the handful of other events that happened to be passing through Miami Gardens.
But that was before the Miami Grand Prix moved in -- before the artificial marina, the aqua chicane or the race weekends that packed in 275,000 fans. Since 2022, the former parking lot now once a year turns into one of the signature stops on the Formula One schedule.
In fact, no circuit has taken less time to become essential to the sport's calendar. Despite existing for barely four years, the Miami Grand Prix is now guaranteed through the 2041 season, making it the longest-contract race in F1.
"People want to come here -- they're looking for excuses," says Stephen Ross, the billionaire real-estate developer who owns the Dolphins, Hard Rock Stadium and the Miami Grand Prix. "The whole area, this is what it's about: It is one of the world's great event cities."
Monte Carlo of Florida
If Monaco, Monza and Spa-Francorchamps were the circuits that defined F1 heritage -- the heartlands of European motor racing -- Miami has come to embody the sport's brash American future. Expanding F1's footprint on this side of the Atlantic had been one of Liberty Media's stated objectives ever since the company acquired the racing series in 2017. But at the time, the only U.S. race was in Austin, Texas -- a Grand Prix with the old-school vibe of a music festival.
As a complement, F1 had visions of Monte Carlo on Biscayne Bay. The original plan called for a downtown circuit, held on the streets of Miami with ocean views. But it didn't take long for that to go skidding into a wall of paperwork and logistical concerns. Liberty soon realized that everything from road closures to constant noise made a downtown event completely unworkable.
"So they came back about six months later," Ross said. "'Do you have something for your stadium?'"
Ross was waiting for precisely that question. With 275 acres of land around a freshly remodeled Hard Rock Stadium, he had spent years trying to cook up ways to develop more events on his site. At one point, he considered building a ballpark for baseball's Miami Marlins. At another, he thought he might be better served by a giant water park. What he settled on was the Miami Open tennis tournament, which Ross moved from nearby Key Biscayne in 2019.
"People thought we were nuts," Ross says.
But the Miami Open's attempts to turn a parking lot into a high-end, luxury tennis event would serve as proof of concept for Formula One. And, some 4 1/2 years after first considering a Grand Prix in South Florida, Ross and his team had their race.
Growing pains
Which isn't to say the Grand Prix came without growing pains. Concerns around the first edition, in 2022, ranged from world champion Max Verstappen complaining about the track surface to fans getting stuck in long bathroom lines. The circuit owners pledged to take both just as seriously. They made other changes such as moving the paddock to the field at Hard Rock Stadium and expanded their ticket offering at both ends of the spectrum, from grandstand seats to the private club areas and the realm of the $280 lobster roll.
As for the men racing the cars, they weren't always blown away by the actual circuit. Two-time world champion Fernando Alonso said last year that Miami was "not the most interesting for the driver, but [is] still producing a good show on Sundays."
And for F1, that much was enough.
"Miami will be part of our bigger strategy to be even stronger in the United States of America -- this is a place where it is crucial to be," F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali said last year after announcing the circuit's contract extension. "We are still very small if you compare to the biggest sports franchises in the U.S.... This will help us to grow in the right direction."
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 01, 2026 12:07 ET (16:07 GMT)
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