They plan to add an additional 20,000 fans to the US Grand Prix

The Circuit of the Americas It plans to host an additional 20,000 fans at this year’s US Formula 1 Grand Prix, to take advantage of the growing interest from Americans.

F1 will return to Austin in October, after COVID-19 Force to cancel last year’s race. The circuit is planning its regular concerts, having already confirmed the performances of Billy Joel and the Twenty One Pilots, and is set to welcome a large crowd amid the growing interest in F1 in the US.

COTA chief, Bobby Epstein, believes this year’s US Grand Prix will be “the best in our history,” and revealed additional territories were opening up to fans due to unprecedented ticket sales.

“Ticket sales are massive, so we’re thrilled in that regard,” Epstein said. Motorsport.com.

“By knowing well in advance, we can add a lot of interesting content about the event. And the extra four months to know the budget is there to deliver an amazing experience is really fun.”

“We have exhausted the capacity we normally prepare for. But since we have time, we are preparing the infrastructure and adding bridges to cross the track, to open up new areas of the circuit that we have not used before.”

“We will go from sold-out tickets to available tickets and run out of tickets again. We hope to have more tickets on sale within a month.”

“An additional 20,000 should be allowed. It will be closer to (number) Silverstone overall.”

Epstein was “optimistic” that this year’s weekend, which runs from October 22-24, could play out as a “normal event”, with F1 recently declaring that the British Grand Prix would be the first race at full capacity since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We’re in June and the progress between February and June has been phenomenal,” Epstein said.

“I hope we continue down the same path, and that as more and more people receive, and as the summer progresses, we continue to get back to normal.”

F1 is known to be considering a second race in Austin later this year to bolster the schedule if necessary, with concerns raised by events in Australia and Brazil.

Although Epstein said Cota is “ready to do what is best for the sport,” he made clear that the talks were not yet serious.

“For us, it’s very easy to host two races, but in terms of whether that actually happens, we’re far from knowing,” Epstein said.

“We had a casual conversation before Baku. We didn’t talk about it (again).”