Can Liberty Media repeat F1's

booming success with MotoGP?

Austin Lindberg, Senior Editor
Apr 12, 2024, 02:57 PM ET

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Legends of F1 and MotoGP Lewis Hamilton and Valentino Rossi swapped rides during a promotional event in 2019.
Mirco Lazzari/Getty Images for Monster Energy

It's hard to imagine now, but there was a time, not all that long ago, when Formula
One was not the darling of the motorsport world that it is today.

Video content was largely restricted on social media, making viral moments nothing more
than a marketer's fantasy. In-person attendance in 2016 was 65% of what it was in 2022,
and in the United States in particular, it was half. Television ratings in the U.S. that year
were 38% of what they were last year.

Then along came Liberty Media, which completed its purchase of F1 in January 2017. Two
years later, "Drive to Survive" debuted on Netflix -- part of the new owners' comprehensive
approach to holistically promote storytelling around the series -- and not long after that,
the sport became the star-studded pop-culture sensation that millions watch each Sunday
on ESPN.

In MotoGP, the calendar may as well have just turned to 2017.

Last week, Liberty announced a takeover of MotoGP parent company Dorna Sports,
acquiring approximately 86% of the company, which will remain independently operated
under Liberty's Formula One Group. The takeover could attract regulatory scrutiny, but
the deal is expected to be completed by the end of 2024.

It has been less than two weeks, but so far, the new owners have been clear: the product is
good.

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"Fans will only have things to look forward to and more people to share their fandom
with," Dorna Sports chief sporting officer Carlos Ezpeleta said during a news conference
on Thursday at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas ahead of this weekend's Grand
Prix of the Americas. "Liberty does not think that the sport needs fixing, and we agree with
that. We think that we have an amazing sport that we have built together with all the
stakeholders in the paddock."

The goal for Liberty is simple: get MotoGP in front of a larger audience. But how will it
accomplish that?

MotoGP's growth opportunities

Making MotoGP an international success story won't be as simple as pulling pages out of
Liberty's "How We Made F1 Into a Season Full of Super Bowls" playbook.

Formula One has long traded on the extravagance of destinations like Monaco and nine-
figure team budgets, creating a sense of luxury and exclusivity that goes hand in hand with
the celebrity culture that has inundated the paddock, which routinely welcomes the likes
of Brad Pitt and Serena Williams. What MotoGP sells is its racing, where top speeds
approach 230 mph, riders drag their knees and elbows across the pavement at every
corner and leave tire marks on one another in fiercely contested overtakes.
Where Liberty succeeded with F1, though, and where it must discover similar success with
MotoGP, is in storytelling.

Expensive cars driven in exotic locales, riders reaching triple-digit speeds just inches off
the asphalt, these moments appeal to core audiences, but history suggests that they alone
aren't enough to attract new fans.

What drew legions of new (and almost equally importantly, younger) fans to F1 were the
personalities of "Drive to Survive." Daniel Ricciardo has enjoyed an admirable grand prix
career, one worth celebrating when the 34-year-old eventually decides enough's enough,
but the man with eight career victories has as devoted of a following as you might expect of
a multi-time world champion. That's almost entirely down to his persona, the colorful
Australian practically became synonymous with "Drive to Survive."

That's the Netflix effect. That's what MotoGP needs.

"I feel that we have a lot of stories to tell," 2023 runner-up and 2024 championship leader
of MotoGP Jorge Martín told ESPN on Thursday. "It is a really risky sport, a sport that you
really play a lot with your life, and I think people would like it a lot if they could see
something like this. Hopefully with Liberty Media on board, they will push the sport and it
will help all of us."

The potential is there.

Marc Márquez is arguably the greatest MotoGP racer of all time, but a career-threatening
arm injury has kept him from adding to his six world championships. Luca Marini
has lived in the shadow of half-brother Valentino Rossi, a seven-time world champion who
transcends the sport, and is now embarking on a quest to restore MotoGP's most storied
team to its place at the front of the field. Pedro Acosta is only two races into his rookie
season but is already making headlines, both for his generational talent and his larger-
than-life personality -- he said overtaking Márquez on his debut was "like when you lose
your virginity."

One source told ESPN that there are no plans for a "Drive to Survive"-like documentary
series in the works, but that will change in time. MotoGP is looking for the right partner to
tell its story, and that selectivity will be vital in a crowded marketplace where no other
sport has truly capitalized on its all-access docuseries quite like F1 has.

And nowhere has F1 felt the Netflix effect with more force than in the United States.
Adding a second race in the country is necessary to help MotoGP's audience expansion.
The issue, however, is that there isn't an obvious candidate to join Circuit of the Americas
on the calendar.

Jorge Martín, front, leads the MotoGP pack at last month's Portuguese Grand Prix. Joao Rico/DeFodi Images via Getty Images

Before Austin became home to the Grand Prix of the Americas in 2013, Laguna Seca in
Salinas, California was an on-and-off home of MotoGP in the U.S. between the late 1980s
and early 2010s. While that venue is almost universally adored, the changes required to
meet the standards of the FIM (MotoGP's sanctioning body) would be prohibitively
expensive.

Various other potential destinations face similar or equally large hurdles. There are
questions of safety, concerns with facilities that don't meet the expectations set by the
championship's newest tracks and worries that locations are situated too far from major
cities.

The physics of motorcycle racing demand large areas of run-off room, space for fallen
riders to come to a (relatively) gradual stop before hitting walls, barriers or any other
structure that can do the human body damage when struck at speed. While the F1 calendar
balloons with street races, including in Miami and Las Vegas, that premise is a total
nonstarter for MotoGP.

If (or when) a second circuit in the U.S. were to be added to the schedule, one source
suggested that MotoGP could construct a Western Hemisphere swing consisting of two
races in the U.S. and another two in South America -- likely in Argentina, where it raced at
Autódromo Termas de Río Hondo off and on between 2014 and 2023, and Brazil, where
Jacarepaguá most recently hosted the series between 1995 and 2004. This could help
expand the series' audience while also improving scheduling efficiencies.

Perhaps the greatest opportunity that Liberty can provide MotoGP with, though, is the
power of association.

Liberty is more than just Formula One; it also owns the Atlanta Braves, SiriusXM, Live
Nation and QuintEvents. Experience with those brands across industries yields a vast
network of contacts, all well-versed in media and promotion.

Leveraging Liberty's networks can open doors to potential partners and sponsors who may
have never heard of MotoGP before last week. If the sport can present its incredible
product to these new audiences, showcasing the personalities of the seemingly fearless
riders who risk life and limb every time they throw a leg over the bike, then Liberty may
well have another motorsport hit on its hands.