yachts at miami grand prix

Fake marina with fake water steals show at Miami Grand Prix

Formula One pictured a race in Miami and envisioned sun, sand, beaches and boats.

So when the inaugural Miami Grand Prix landed at Hard Rock Stadium, nowhere near the South Beach backdrop F1 was seeking, the promoter said don't worry.

F1 wants boats in a suburban neighborhood?

Done. They built a fake marina. With fake water, and all.

Well, it's not really water at all in The Mia Marina, located between turns 4 and 6 at the purpose-built venue around the Miami Dolphins' stadium. It can be found at the corner of NW 27th Ave. and NW 199th St. in Miami Gardens, a land-locked neighborhood some 15 miles away from F1's initial desired downtown location.

It isn't exactly Monaco, but the man-made marina is a 25,000-square-foot dry dock designed to look like water. The 10 yachts are real -- one appears to be booked by Michael Mak, the local founder of Celebrity Sports Entertainment; one waved the British flag; another is named "Wheels" -- but the water is just plywood that's been covered in a decal.

Tickets to the "Yacht Club" started at $9,500 up to $38,000 for a four-person pass.

It's part of a five-star weekend experience created by Tom Garfinkel, vice chairman of the Miami Dolphins and Hard Rock Stadium and managing partner of the inaugural Miami Grand Prix. He's worked with owner Stephen Ross to turn Hard Rock Stadium into a global sports and entertainment venue worthy of the top events in the world.

Hard Rock has hosted Super Bowls, college playoff games, a major tennis tournament, international soccer, concerts and the "Rolling Loud" musical festival. From Jay-Z and Beyonce, to Serena Williams and Neymar, the biggest names have all been to Hard Rock.

And on Saturday, former First Lady Michelle Obama watched an F1 practice session from the back of seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton's pit.

"Steve Ross had a vision and for us to truly host the world's great big events, and for that to be true, Formula One has got to be on that list," Garfinkel told The Associated Press. "I don't know there's another stadium in the world that can say they've had Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen, Patrick Mahomes and U2 and Jay-Z and Beyonce and Messi and Neymar all at the same venue."

The event is the hottest ticket in sports right now. George Lucas was a guest Saturday, and so was Greg Norman, Michael Strahan and Jeff Gordon. The English entertainer James Corden has been in the paddock three consecutive days, and Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen was hanging outside McLaren hospitality awaiting friend Daniel Ricciardo.

"The demands from sponsors and fans has been off the charts, unlike anything I've seen in my time in Formula One," said McLaren head Zak Brown, an American. "I really like where we are in North America as far as Formula One's popularity."

Garfinkel was pursuing a race in Miami long before F1 built a fast and frenzied American following behind the Netflix docuseries "Drive To Survive." The race wasn't officially added to the 2022 calendar until last season -- it gives the United States two races for the first time since 1984 -- but the first meetings were in early 2018.

F1 had been purchased by Liberty Media, an American company, and Garfinkel figured the U.S. might have a shot at expansion. Miami is the 11th different venue to host an F1 race in the United States, but the series had struggled to gain traction in the country until late. The U.S. went four years without an F1 event before Circuit of America's in Austin, Texas, brought the European series back to the States in 2012.

It took years for COTA to grow, and behind the "DTS" mania last year's race in Austin drew more than 300,000 over three days. The U.S. will have three races in 2023 when the Las Vegas Strip is added to the F1 calendar.

The buzz is "mega," said Mercedes head Toto Wolff.

"The city is hyped -- is that how you say it?" Wolff said. "Formula One is all around, the amount of guest requests we have is amazing. I think we've finally landed in North America."

Attendance was capped at 85,000 a day in an attempt to create a high-end experience void of long concession waits and freedom to roam the massive grounds. A gondola can take guests from the marina to the The Beach Club, where Post Malone went head-to-head with F1 qualifying.

But there have been hiccups, from congested pedestrian bridges, long walks from point to point under the hot Florida sun, and traffic snarls surrounding the stadium. Some teams were upset Friday over the guest experience inside the Paddock Club, which cost $11,000 for a three-day pass.

Brown cautioned to wait until the checkered flag before grading Miami's first race.

"Putting on a good first-year event is a challenge to get everything right, given the size and scale and newness to it," Brown said. "But if you look at Austin, 10 years on, they had record attendance last year. Silverstone has been around for 50-plus years and is already a sellout. So, I think putting on a great event, and then having it be sustainable over decades -- I don't say it's easy to do, but clearly it can be done.

"Let's just get it right, put on a good show for the fans, and I think there's a tremendous amount of runway here.

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F1's Miami Grand Prix will keep their fake marina — See why it is an incredible place to watch a race

• F1's most anticipated race of the year was the inaugural Miami Grand Prix on a new track that surrounds Hard Rock Stadium, home of the NFL's Miami Dolphins.
• While the glitz and glamour of the race is being compared to the Monaco Grand Prix, the one thing Miami could not replicate was putting the race directly on the water.
• Instead, designers brought "water" to the Miami International Autodrome in the form of a marina with boats and fake "water." 
• While many mocked the marina, it will be back in 2023.
• We took a tour, and it is an incredible way to watch a race. Take a look at the photos below.

Everything about the Miami Grand Prix screams, "luxury," sometimes even literally.

But one part of the new track that everybody was talking about and wanted to see is "The Yachts at the MIA Marina." While officials originally wanted the race in the downtown area and on the water, that fell through, so they had to come up with something else.

The area does have other activities for people not fortunate enough to snag tickets to the boats.

But the stars of the area are clearly the boats, as everybody wanted photos in front of the marina.

The one feature that seems to be the fascination of most is the fake water which is just painted plywood.

This led to many jokes and memes.

—Matt Amys (@mattamys) May 2, 2022

And media personalities going for a "swim."

—Sky Sports F1 (@SkySportsF1) May 5, 2022

To be fair, sports are more of a TV product these days, and on TV, the marina water looked realistic.

More importantly for the people on the ground, it is a fabulous way to watch a race with real yachts from top manufacturers, including Azimut, Hinckley, and Midnight Express.

That is if you can afford the tickets, which were being sold for $9,500 each for the 2022 race.

Each boat can accommodate 15-20 guests and had a seating area on the dock that was stocked with snacks and drinks. There was also a QR code for ordering food or other drinks that includes an "elevated food and beverage experience" from the nearby Yacht Club Owners Lounge, which guests also have access to for additional seating options.

The boats had bartenders on board and the tickets come with beer, white wine, and champagne. No red wine is allowed on the boats, presumably for fear of stains. Shoes are not allowed on the boats either.

Each boat was different, but all came with elevated seating from the dock and TVs inside to watch the TV broadcast of the race. "Luxury restrooms" are also available nearby.

A couple of the boats had a second level for an even higher view of the track.

The boats also had a lower level, perhaps for a chance to get out of the sun and maybe even take a nap.

Some of the boats had a more open-air concept.

There were typically seating areas on the boats facing the dock, which also faced turns 6-8, some of the most important on the track.

For those hoping to see the marina at a Miami Dolphins game, I have some bad news.

It is just a temporary structure. In fact, just about everything about the new track will be taken down after the race, except for the garage area and the track itself. So it will be interesting to see what the marina looks like next year.

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Miami’s Inaugural Grand Prix Was a Roaring Success, but Its Fake Yacht Marina Stole the Show

Crashes, winners, losers, celebrities. last weekend's gp miami had everything, but a fake marina may have trumped them all., michael verdon, michael verdon's most recent stories.

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• Share This Article

The most-remembered visual from last weekend’s inaugural Miami Grand Prix won’t be Max Verstappen holding up the winner’s trophy. It won’t even be the Schumacher-Vettel crash. It’ll be the impossibly aquamarine waters around the Mia Marina, between turns 4 and 6, that instantly gained fans, foes, memes and even labels of “sell-out” to F1’s heritage. But last weekend’s sell-out refers to attendance. The event was indeed sold out, with more than 240,000 fans passing through the gates.

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Mia Marina could’ve been imagined by Disney. And it made perfect sense being located near Hard Rock Stadium. The landlocked “marina” was much closer to the airport than South Beach. The marina had 10 real boats on trailers, surrounded by 25,000 feet of plywood that came up to their waterlines. The plywood was then covered with a vinyl decal to look kinda-sorta like turquoise water.

The complex had docks, real sand around “The Beach Club,” a gondola for transport, and an “Azimut” boat shed that looked like the Italian yacht builder’s booth at the Miami Yacht Show. “The Yacht Club,” as it was known in the paddock, had tickets priced from $9,500 to $38,000.

Even the crashes were memorable because they happened near the fake water.  Courtesy F1

When Miami was considered as a possible F1 venue four years ago, the organizers imagined a location like Monaco, with narrow streets winding through the city’s harbor, and yachts as the backdrop. F1 wanted those yachts and that beautiful water transplanted to Miami.

Tom Garfinkel, vice chairman of the Miami Dolphins and the Hard Rock Stadium, said that his group had considered downtown Miami, but that it wasn’t feasible to run the racetrack through it. So, they moved to plan B. “If they want a marina, we’ll build one,” said Garfinkel.

When they did, the memes started.

Me after paying $2,000 for a standing ticket #MiamiGP pic.twitter.com/wGQqhV5bQs — Matt (@mattamys) May 2, 2022

The organizers were helped by the fact that F1, owned by US-based Liberty Media, is the hottest event in the country right now. That is, in some part, because of the Netflix series “Drive to Survive.” Miami attracted record crowds for the F1 series and side events last weekend. The Mia Marina also had its share of celebrities, ranging from Michelle Obama, George Lucas, Greg Norman, Michael Strahan, Michael Jordan, David Beckham, Serena and Venus Williams, LeBron James, Pharrell Williams and comedian James Corden.

Before Miami came along, Austin, Texas, was the only F1 race in the US. It took years to grow, but last year’s event drew more than 300,000 spectators in three days. That record attendance is good news for Miami’s Grand Prix , already on the books for 2023. The Las Vegas strip will also be added to the F1 calendar next year.

The “marina,” as it looked in January.  Courtesy F1

The Grand Prix in Miami was limited to 85,000 people per day to create a high-end experience, with the freedom to walk around the Yacht Club and the grounds.

Garfinkel has high hopes for the event going forward. “I don’t know there’s another stadium in the world that can say they’ve had Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen, Patrick Mahomes and U2 and Jay-Z and Beyoncé and Messi and Neymar all at the same venue.”

But the biggest question for next year: Will they add more boats to the marina?

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Miami Grand Prix's Fake Marina Was Good, Actually

Miami f1's signature feature, this pretend marina, was a delight. you just had to see it in person..

Over the weekend, Formula 1 hosted its inaugural Miami Grand Prix to much fanfare and a whole lot of drama. One of the easiest targets for detractors came in the form of the track’s fake marina , where a handful of yachts were parked and then surrounded by fake water — but honestly? The marina was great.

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I get it. F1 does tend to make itself something of an easy target, what with its tunnel-vision focus on all things glamour that can tend to border on camp. The “marina” was one of those ideas — in order to create some faux “Monaco of America” vibes at an inland race track that promoters desperately wanted you to think was replete with oceanside views, they constructed a silly little enclosure for rich folks to watch on-track action from, essentially, a dry-docked boat.

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I even had a laugh about it, since I had foolishly believed the enclosure would be filled with actual water . It was not. But I made a point of walking out to the marina while I was at the race over the weekend, and y’know what? It really wasn’t that bad. It was even kind of cute.

My favorite part about it? Fans could actually be seated at a “waterfront” restaurant and dine next to the water, and there were covered tables for relaxing nearby, too. Ridiculous, yes, but the commitment to the bit was so stunning that it filled me with a kind of childlike joy that I simply did not think was tangible in my olden years. You can see the “restaurant” building on the top right of this image:

It was cheesy, but so is so much else in this world. If you’ve ever been to a music festival, you’ve definitely seen a fake beach at some point. If you’ve been to a Rainforest Café, this is the same concept. If you’ve had drinks at some trendy bar that tried to emulate the feeling of some European vista, the Miami marina was the same thing. Folks were just hating on it because it was something different. We just forgot how to use our imagination.

You can hate on it all you want, but the Miami Grand Prix marina was Good, actually.

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Why the miami grand prix ended up with a fake marina and dry-docked yachts, share this article.

Sunday’s Miami Grand Prix — one of Formula 1’s two American races currently on the schedule — is all about the glitz and glam and flashy, Miami vibes. And judging from some early views of the 3.36-mile, 19-turn circuit built around Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, it certainly has the potential to live up to the hype — especially if the racing is good.

One particular element of the venue, however, leaves quite a bit to be desired: the fake marina.

Eyeing the idea of an American version of the famed and glamorous Monaco Grand Prix , Miami organizers originally hoped for a waterfront venue with a circuit in the downtown area and over a bridge to the Port of Miami, as the Miami Herald reported last month . But when that plan didn’t work out and the race ended up being around Hard Rock Stadium, there was still an attempt at creating a waterfront atmosphere.

Enter The Yachts at MIA Marina, a faux harbor/beach area with, obviously, yachts. More from the Miami Herald :

It won’t be as picturesque as it would have been along the turquoise bay, with gorgeous aerial camera views of cruise ships, the skyline and fans watching from yachts and sailboats. But [Dolphins and Hard Rock Stadium owner Stephen] Ross’ group is doing its best to replicate a waterfront ambiance at the landlocked venue. In the center of the track, near turns 11, 12 and 13, will be a 24,000 square-foot beach club zone featuring a resort-style pool with luxury cabanas, bars and DJs playing music. And that’s not all! A Monaco-inspired faux marina “Yacht Club” is being constructed — complete with about a dozen dry-docked yachts — on the infield of turns 6, 7 and 8. Some race patrons paid $38,000 for a four-person “Yacht Club” package, $19,000 for a two-person pass and $9,500 for a single.

The marina construction in progress in January 2022. (Formula One Crypto.com Miami Grand Prix)

The Yachts at MIA Marina, taken Sunday, May 1, 2022 in Miami Gardens, Florida. (Hiro Ueno/F1 Miami Grand Prix)

The discovery of the fake marina then led to this funny bit from Sky Sports’ Craig Slater, pointing out the absurdity of the situation and hilariously “swimming” in the “water.”

Joking that the “sea breeze is in my hair” — the venue is about 10 miles away from the Atlantic Ocean — Slater said: “It’s such a hot day today, I think I might take a jump into the cool… water.”

Nothing to see here, just Craig Slater having a swim at the #MiamiGP 's fake harbour 😂 pic.twitter.com/LB48SQgedq — Sky Sports F1 (@SkySportsF1) May 3, 2022

His bit about “enhanced reality” — welcomed by many F1 fans with more jokes — then continued as he attempted a little backstroke on the flat, waterless ground.

So no matter how real the fake marina will look on TV, just remember, it’s not.

No Daniel. Noooo. pic.twitter.com/RRFRUVrLRd — ESPN F1 (@ESPNF1) May 3, 2022

Following two practices on Friday and another Saturday, qualifying for the Miami Grand Prix is set for noon ET Saturday. The race is scheduled for Sunday at 3:30 p.m. ET on ABC.

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