South Florida Motorsports has reached record sponsorship revenue for this year’s F1 Miami event, according to event president Tyler Epp, and entitlement partner Crypto.com is back to advertising heavily with a rejuvenated cryptocurrency sector. The Crypto.com F1 Miami Grand Prix weekend starts today and runs through Sunday, with the fourth edition now having 30 total sponsors across four categories, according to the event’s website.
Founding partners are Gainbridge, Hard Rock, J.P. Morgan and Red Bull; event supporters include Heineken, Liquid I.V., MSC Cruises, JPMorgan Chase, Ticketmaster, Verizon and Psycho Bunny; while campus partners include Glenfiddich, Jack Daniel’s and High Noon. The crypto space has seen renewed interest in recent months following the election of President Trump, which led to bitcoin topping $100,000 in value for the first time in December.
One of the new activations that Crypto.com has executed for this year’s race is working with SFM to let fans pay for food and beverages using cryptocurrency. The crypto exchange installed its Pay platform with merchants on site, and fans will have to use the Crypto.com app to do the transactions.
Company CMO Steven Kalifowitz in a prepared statement said: “Deepening our partnerships with phenomenal brands like the Formula 1 Crypto.com Miami Grand Prix, while helping expand access for guests to utilize crypto, is just a natural next step for us.” Fans who use Crypto Pay on site will be entered into a sweepstakes to win F1 tickets to a different race. The site is also doing a separate sweepstakes for tickets to next year’s Miami Grand Prix for people who have the Crypto.com app and correctly predict the winner of this Sunday’s grand prix. And it has released a “digital collectible” around the race; those who claim it will be entered into a chance to win physical artwork, event merchandise or tickets to next year’s race.
Epp said that what he has learned about Crypto.com’s execs “is their business ebbs and flows with the markets, so they deepen their investment and are a little bit more prominent (this year), and that’s their decision how they invest across their different enterprises.”
Verizon has been working with F1 Miami since the inaugural edition in 2022 to help power cellular service around Hard Rock Stadium, but the sides say they’ve now expanded their deal to include more branding and signage at the venue during race weekend, along with immersive fan experiences that were not detailed.
Gainbridge has set up pickleball courts in its North Campus activation and will host a couple players from the PPA Tour this weekend in Tyra Black and Ryan Fu. Gainbridge, the company owned by Cadillac F1 Team investor Dan Towriss, title sponsors the start/finish grandstand in addition to the North Campus.
Lego is not a sponsor of the race but is a licensing partner of F1, and it has built life-sized versions of all 10 Formula 1 cars, each of which contains over 400,000 pieces, as part of its activation this weekend at F1 Miami. Around 125 students from the Miami Gardens area got to check out the circuit Thursday and one of the activities was a LEGO build and getting a free set of Lego toy cars to take home.
Epp also called out how Hard Rock continues to activate around the event including its beach club, a part of the circuit which will have artists like Steve Aoki and Pitbull performing there this weekend while cars go around the track.
Meanwhile, ultra luxury watch maker Richard Mille is sponsoring SFM’s new Precision Driving Club, the ultra-luxury private club designed to monetize the Miami Grand Prix F1 track when it’s not in use by the pros. It also will have signage around the track.
