Will Taylor Swift Fans Stick Around for a Formula 1 Race in Austin?

By
at Internationaled.org

Published: March 11, 2016

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The U.S. Grand Prix will go ahead as planned in October 2016, the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) confirmed this week, allaying doubts raised by the race's provisional status on this year's calendar.

This is great news for Formula One, which cannot afford more problems in America after the 2005 fiasco at Indianapolis and the unfulfilled promise of a New Jersey race, across the Hudson River from New York City.

The really big news, though—at least according to the circuit's press release and many of the stories that have been written since the announcement—is that Taylor Swift will perform a concert at the track after qualifying on the Saturday.

"It will be a one-off show. Her only show in 2016," COTA chairman Bobby Epstein said, per Forbes' Christian Sylt. "We think we can bring in 100,000 new people and put on the biggest show."

According to Sylt, the Swift concert should allow COTA to break not only its own attendance record (265,449 over three days at the 2012 U.S. Grand Prix), but the all-time F1 record of 353,700 at the 2007 Spanish Grand Prix.

The real question, at least for those concerned about the future of F1 in the U.S., is: How many of those fans will actually watch anything other than the concert?



When Swift came to Dallas in October 2015, just three hours up the interstate from Austin and COTA, resale tickets were going for an average of $354, according to the Dallas Observer's Paige Skinner. For anyone who paid those prices, $150 for three-day general admission at COTA, including the concert, will look like a bargain—whether they bother to watch any on-track action or not.

The circuit may indeed sell 100,000 extra tickets, but don't confuse that with 100,000 extra people watching F1.

In November 2015, Eric Dexheimer of the Austin American-Statesman reported that COTA's state funding was being cut by...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Formula 1

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