{"id":193819,"date":"2025-06-18T07:33:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T07:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/193819\/"},"modified":"2025-06-18T07:33:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T07:33:09","slug":"stefano-domenicali-wants-to-make-f1-bigger-than-the-biggest-sport-in-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/193819\/","title":{"rendered":"Stefano Domenicali wants to make F1 bigger than the biggest sport in the world"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cDon\u2019t laugh,\u201d says<\/strong> Stefano Domenicali,<\/strong> \u201cbut I don\u2019t have a car. I don\u2019t drive. People don\u2019t believe me, but it\u2019s true.\u201d It might seem a strange confession for the CEO of Formula 1<\/a>, but Domenicali has been busy; there isn\u2019t much time for Sunday spins when you\u2019re steering the buzziest sport on the planet.<\/p>\n

Since he took the top job in 2021, F1 has exploded. Once dominated by an older male audience \u2013 in 2017, just eight per cent of fans were women \u2013 it now has a rapidly growing fanbase of 16\u201324 year olds, and close to an even gender split. Last year alone, F1 says, 90 million new fans watched the sport \u2013 boosting the total to more than 800 million people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the past five years, we\u2019ve completely changed the way we communicate to fans,\u201d says Domenicali. Central to that has been the sport\u2019s full-bodied commitment to thrilling, cinematic storytelling, through projects like the hit Netflix docuseries Drive To Survive<\/a>. \u201cThe need to be always on \u2018record\u2019 mode, to be in a situation where you have to anticipate things in order to be relevant, is really the biggest thing that I\u2019m proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Alamy<\/p>\n

We meet in April, the week after the Japanese Grand Prix. The 59-year-old returned from Suzuka yesterday, and has done a full day at F1\u2019s London headquarters before he flies to Bahrain for the next race. Domenicali is his usual chirpy self, grinning the same way he would at Lando Norris<\/a> after a P1 finish. Apparently, jet lag doesn\u2019t affect him. \u201cIt\u2019s quite an active schedule, but it\u2019s OK. We are young inside!\u201d he says with a smile.<\/p>\n

The F1 calendar now has 24 races per season, and spans five continents. Just as teams and drivers are always seeking quicker lap times, Domenicali is target-focused \u2013 constantly pushing for increased exposure, more lucrative brand partnerships, and improved fan satisfaction. \u201cI hear people saying 24 races is too many but I say, \u2018Wait a minute, how many games are they doing in football?\u2019 Every young person has a problem of not stopping their finger moving up and down [their phones], so you need to create content,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Formula 1\u2019s success has turned a sport already blessed with a who\u2019s who of luxury brand partners into a commercial behemoth. Domenicali has been at the heart of this, not least a 10-year deal with LVMH<\/a>, which started this season and is estimated to be worth $1 billion. \u201cF1 is of course about racing,\u201d he says, \u201cbut it\u2019s now more than that. Not many sports are truly global \u2013 but we are. We cut into a lot of verticals: lifestyle, travel, fashion, technology and innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cDon\u2019t laugh,\u201d says Stefano Domenicali, \u201cbut I don\u2019t have a car. I don\u2019t drive. People don\u2019t believe me,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[4199,707,4200,79077,79078,1071,93,79,79079,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-193819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-formula1","11":"tag-gq-heroes","12":"tag-gq-heroes-2025","13":"tag-racing","14":"tag-sport","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-sports-profiles","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114703211167567204","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}