The Circuit of the Americas has spent 14 years building a Formula 1 race in Austin, now it’s trying to build something bigger.
Circuit bosses have looked outside of F1 in their aim to make COTA a permanent place on America’s cultural calendar, the way the Masters golf tournament owns a week every April, or California-based Coachella owns the start of festival season.
The new positioning line is simple: “This is the one.”
Carter Nance, COTA’s new Chief Marketing Officer, told Sector the phrase wasn’t chosen to compete with the other 23 races on the F1 calendar, but to give the MSC Cruises United States Grand Prix something to anchor its identity around for years rather than seasons.
“I think we were just trying to find a position that felt like something we could anchor on for more than a year,” he explained.
“Like the Masters with ‘a tradition unlike any other’, we thought it was time for us to create some symbols and some language that can stick around.”
Nance was direct about where the comparison does, and does not, come from. COTA’s internal reference points for the campaign weren’t other motorsport venues at all.
“So we looked at the Masters and Coachella, not because we want to emulate them in any sort of way,” he said
“We’re always going to be about racing first. But we would like to have that cultural visibility where here in America, it’s like when spring comes around, you start to think about the Masters, even if you’re not a golf fan.”
The foundation of that positioning, Nance said, rests on something COTA has that no other American circuit does.
Unlike the Crypto.com Miami Grand Prix and the Heineken Las Vegas Grand Prix, Austin was purpose-built for F1, rather than adapted or borrowed for a single weekend a year.
We’re always going to be about racing first. But we would like to have that cultural visibility where here in America, it’s like when spring comes around, you start to think about the Masters, even if you’re not a golf fan.
Carter Nance
That distinction shapes everything else COTA is now trying to build around the race itself, from permanent infrastructure to the scale of what it can stage on site.
“It gives us a very unique opportunity to continue to build experiences,” added Nance.
“If we were a temporary setup, like some of the other circuits, we would not have the ability to bring this scale of experience.”
The clearest expression of that advantage is COTALAND, a 34-attraction theme park built directly against the track, opening on 26 September.
Rides sit along the circuit’s final corners before the main straight, adding a permanent physical layer to the venue that a temporary street circuit simply couldn’t accommodate.
“So 34 experiences, all kinds of rides for all kinds of ages. And it will be an additional spectacle now, along with our tower, the circuit club, turn one, we’re building more IP now, as an experience and a visual layer to the whole experience,” said Nance.
“I don’t think a concert of the scale of what we normally put on would likely be possible at a lot of circuits, given their limited real estate.”
Nance was careful throughout to frame the move as confidence in COTA’s own product rather than comparison against the rest of the calendar.
The new positioning has not been built to pit the US Grand Prix against the other races on the F1 calendar but to highlight its own achievements and offerings.
“We’re not here to kick sand on anybody else,” added Nance.
“We think our experience speaks for itself. So it just comes down to we’re promoters, we’re marketers, and we want to put our best foot forward in terms of the language and the positioning.
“I think ‘this is the one’ is an acknowledgement of us. We think we’ve earned a seat at the table at this point after 14 years of success.”
Part of that language draws directly on Austin’s own calendar rather than motorsport specifically.
COTA’s race weekend this October lands alongside a home football game between Texas and Ole Miss, expected to draw more than 100,000 fans across town, and an NBA pre-season fixture between the San Antonio Spurs and Houston Rockets on the Friday of race weekend itself.
“So October is just a massive time in this town, if you’re into entertainment, big events, big cultural gatherings, ‘this is the one’ works on that level too,” he said.
“Ideally, it becomes the entry point for a lot of new fans into the sport – they come because they just heard it’s a great time and they’re blown away by the true F1 experience. And we’ve now grown a fan for the entire F1 sport.
“In a lot of ways, I like to say it’s F1 and Austin. It’s not F1 in Austin, if that makes sense. And I think that’s why a lot of drivers and teams and fans appreciate it.”
