Netflix's Formula 1: Drive to Survive is driving American interest in "the most European of sports"

The Atlantic

"In Drive to Survive, F1 has found a way to convert Americans to a sport they have traditionally ignored," says Amanda Mull. "In the process, it may have hit on something even more valuable, something every American sports league is desperately seeking: a recipe for building and sustaining interest at a time when sports, facing all manner of new competition, are losing their grip on the nation’s psyche." Mull adds: "For me, Drive to Survive worked like a trapdoor directly into F1 fandom, and it seems to have done the same for lots of previously indifferent Americans. Netflix is averse to releasing viewership numbers, but a spokesperson told me that the third season was the show’s most popular yet; it was also the platform’s seventh-most-watched series in March. Circumstantial evidence of its influence abounds: ESPN, which broadcasts Grand Prix events in the United States, says race ratings are up 50 percent over 2020. The Circuit of the Americas, which hosts the United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas, plans to add 20,000 more seats for its sold-out October race. Zak Brown, the CEO of McLaren Racing and a periodic presence on Drive to Survive, told me that the show has had an enormous impact on the sport. For people like him, who weren’t previously among F1’s most public faces, that means getting recognized in airports and while out to dinner."