Beneath the neon glow of the Las Vegas Strip and in the shadow of its casinos, the 2024 Grand Prix of Formula One operated as more than a race. It was a stage for spectacle, a gathering of global stars, haute cuisine and luxury hospitality exploiting the momentum of motorsport’s US expansion. With an official attendance figure of 306,000 over the weekend, the event registered as one of the largest attendance figures of the season. 

Among the 300,000-plus attendees were a disproportionate number of Hollywood names, global entertainers and social-top-table regulars — a signal that Las Vegas is now vying to be the crown jewel of celebrity Grand Prix experiences. The guest list included the likes of Paris Hilton, Gordon Ramsay (chef-turned-TV-star), and Jared Leto. 

Where other Grand Prix might stop at super-yachts or villas, Las Vegas added runway-worthy arrival entrances, VIP lounges in the heart of casino-resorts, and bespoke hospitality where you might bump into the chef who’s just served you caviar while team engineers scouted corners. The event was less about the racing lap-time and more about the VIP lap of luxury.

If the engines roared on the Strip, the real hum was in the kitchens. The race weekend became a highlight for the global restaurant industry. At the specially erected “Bellagio Fountain Club” and other high-end venues, names such as Alain Ducasse, Wolfgang Puck, Jean‑Georges Vongerichten and other Michelin-starred chefs turned the event into a culinary festival. 

One result: high-net-worth guests weren’t only watching cars go around a corner; they were dining on curated menus, sipping ultra-premium labels, and exchanging business cards between grandstands and gourmet courses. The gastronomy and the gear went hand in glove.

The layering of hospitality tiers was striking. On one end, tens of thousands of general-admission fans bought more accessible tickets; on the other, the highest tiers cost tens of thousands of dollars for access to pit-lane suites, celebrity chef dinners, and rooftop terraces with views of both cars and cocktails. The event organisers explicitly positioned the race as a luxury platform rather than merely a sporting event.

For the resort and restaurant business in Las Vegas, the Grand Prix was a boon. Casino-resorts reported record occupancy and food & beverage spend. One resort executive described the weekend as “New Year’s Eve level but concentrated into four days”. 

On the track, of course, the race was real — cars reached over 220 mph down the length of the Strip circuit, and the championship implications were impossible to ignore. But it is striking how proximate the racing and the marketing have become. The venue’s transformation of the Strip into a race circuit dovetailed with its transformation of hospitality into commerce. Another way to put it: you could arrive for the thrill of the race and stay for the dinner, the brands, the lounge, the access.

In that sense, the Las Vegas Grand Prix may now hold the title of the Grand Prix with the highest ratio of A- and B-list celebrity attendance, luxury hospitality spend, and gastronomic spectacle. Whereas other events look to motorsport first, Las Vegas looks to lifestyle first and motorsport second — and the very act of attending becomes part of a broader high-end weekend.

Yet the model is not without its tensions. While attendance numbers are large, other metrics show that television viewership slipped in year two, down roughly 30% in the US compared to the debut. The question arises: is the value derived primarily from brand exposure and luxury guest experiences rather than from cultivating mass-market fandom? Moreover, in Las Vegas, where luxury is standard, the costs of hospitality and accommodation are steep — raising the bar for entry.

The 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix has turned motorsport into magnet for celebrity, cuisine and capital. It is less about who sets the fastest lap and more about who gets to sit beside the fastest car — at a table curated by an elite chef, inside a suite overlooking a desert straight. For F1’s expansion into lifestyle, Las Vegas is not just a street circuit—it is a showroom: of speed, of social status, and of modern luxury.