It was the biggest party of the year to date. And it happened to coincide with the first US race on the 2023 Formula One calendar: The Miami Grand Prix.

The weather for the entire week leading into the weekend was spectacular. Not as hot or muggy as last year with just a spot of rain on the morning of the race. The venue increased capacity by 30,000, and it was sold out. The stars and celebrities showed up big time, from Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos to the Jonas Brothers, Vin Diesel, the Williams sisters, LL Cool J, Tom Cruise and the A-list goes on. It truly felt like a massive, three-day party in and around Miami Hard Rock Stadium, where an F1 race just happened to be taking place. That’s the type of experience you’ll get in attending this particular Grand Prix.

The Destination

If you’re making the trip to Miami for the Grand Prix in early May, it makes sense to enjoy as much of South Florida as you can at this ideal time of year. I’d recommend spending the entire week and starting at the Four Seasons Fort Lauderdale.

The property is located right on Fort Lauderdale Beach and just opened in March of 2022. It has a very beachy, boutique feel. There are multiple pools located on the third floor with huge views of the ocean. There are plenty of plush cabanas for relaxing in and out of the sun. The beach is just across the street, where the Four Seasons offers complimentary beach chairs, umbrellas, towels and water for guests. The water is crystal clear to the sandy bottom, and it’s pretty shallow for a ways out.

The third floor also features the fitness area, spa and Evelyn’s restaurant. The Mediterranean eatery is open for three meals, and each is exceptional. I’d recommend the fresh made pita, hummus, falafel and whole branzino for dinner. Each of these is a distinctive, signature dish that sets Evelyn’s apart.

Although this is the Miami Grand Prix, the race venue is located in Miami Gardens. This is pretty much equidistant from both Miami and Fort Lauderdale. So if you’re looking for more of a beach vacation with your F1 experience, this is the ideal choice. However, if you want to be in the thick of the party scene—or you have events to attend in Miami—then you might consider breaking up the trip between Fort Lauderdale in the first part of the week and then move to the Four Seasons Miami for the race weekend. That’s what I did. But not before talking to Alpine driver, Esteban Ocon, who chose the Four Seasons Fort Lauderdale for his entire stay.

The Four Seasons Miami on Brickell Ave. is much more of a luxury urban experience. And for the race weekend, it was F1 themed at the valet area with a podium for taking photos, speakers piping in F1 car sounds and the valets all wearing mechanics overalls. It was all designed to immerse guests in the F1 experience.

The reception area, restaurants and pools are all located on the seventh floor. The pools feature traditional cabanas as well as these jungle-like nooks with vines providing the shade overhead and bushes on either side for privacy. Breakfast and lunch are both served to the cabanas, and there’s a separate pool that is seemingly designed for Instagram with hammocks strung between palm trees and only a couple inches of water below. It’s both relaxing and Instagram friendly.

The Spectacle

The premier party venue for the 2023 Miami Grand Prix was the Fountainbleu Miami Beach. The sprawling pool area was transformed into a club venue with a floating platform in front of the stage that hosted a premium VIP section with tables starting at $15K. The VIP daybeds and general admission weren’t bad, either, as you are still outside, and the evening weather was perfect for dancing the night away.

The Fountainbleu hosted shows on Saturday and Sunday nights. The first featured Martin Garrix and for race day on Sunday it was a double-header with Kaskade and Ludacris (also of Fast and the Furious fame). The venue was exceptional and featured light and laser shows that illuminated the hotel buildings surrounding the pool, along with the palm trees and adjacent structures. The shows were high energy, and it didn’t hurt that the wind picked up a bit on Saturday as a small storm was approaching. It supercharged the sexiness for which Miami nightlife is best known.

The Go Carting

Alfa Romeo driver Valtteri Bottas is a partner in the FNLD GRVL gravel bike event taking place this June in his home country of Finland. When he’s in the US for races, such as the US Grand Prix last year, he and his partner, Tiffany Cromwell, have been doing promotional rides and events to connect with local cyclists and generate awareness for the event. For the Miami Grand Prix, however, Valtteri and Co. decided to mix in some go-carting with the cycling, and it was pretty phenomenal.

Following a morning ride and brunch, a small group of about a dozen of us drove out to Homestead Miami Speedway to test our go-carting skills against one of top 20 race car drivers on the planet. That said, Valtteri is extremely humble and low key. And since the go cart attendants were not made aware that Valtteri would be there and didn’t recognize him, they treated him like any other group participant, complete with basic instructions on how to put on a racing helmet.

The carting program includes two qualifying sessions followed by a 25-lap race. Valtteri topped the time sheet in Q1 with Tiffany in second. I was a full second off the pace in P5. In between sessions, I consulted with Valtteri about his turn-in point for turn one and whether he was flat out for the whole turn. Yes, he was. For Q2, I improved up to P3, just two tenths off Valtteri in P2 and four tenths off of Tiffany in P1.

For the race, the attendants decided to mix up the cars. Unfortunately, I ended up with the equivalent of a Williams. It was so slow that I didn’t have to brake for any of the turns. Admittedly, there was very little braking required. As you can see from the video above, I was a sitting duck on the straights. Valtteri passed me up the inside in the third clip and then takes off down the main straight. He’d end up winning the race, of course, and Tiffany came home P2. I ended up a respectable P5 (out of 12). So I was midfield, which is more than I can say for Williams.

The Sport

We headed into the Miami race weekend with a few key storylines that have developed over the previous five races:

1. The Red Bulls are even more dominant and untouchable than last year, but Perez is putting up a decent fight to keep it close in the driver’s standings

2. Aston Martin is the big surprise. Fernando Alonso clearly knew something about this when he made the switch from Alpine last season. You could see it in his face when he was interviewed for Drive to Survive Season 5. He looked like he had a big secret.

3. Mercedes, Ferrari and McLaren all went in the wrong direction for 2023. These once dominant teams are struggling to keep pace with Aston Martin, while the Red Bulls are in a completely different class.

After Baku, we returned to the standard race weekend format with three practice sessions, qualifying on Saturday and then race day Sunday. The grid was looking pretty typical until FP3, when Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas slotted into P7. This came as somewhat of a surprise, since the team had been off the back all season, and it was considerably faster than teammate Zhou Guanyu. What might explain this newfound form? Could it have been the go carting on Wednesday? After all, a win is a win, and there’s no telling what sways the confidence of these top athletes. Indeed, there were high hopes in the Alfa Romeo garage going to qualifying later in the day.

The pace was real, as Bottas advanced to Q3 in P7 for the first time this season. Notably, his former Mercedes teammate, Lewis Hamilton, did not make it through, while Kevin Magnussen (Haas), Pierre Gasly (Alpine) and Esteban Ocon (Alpine) all did. As the Q3 session started, Verstappen made an error on his first flying lap and had to back out. Due to a lack of fresh tires, Bottas planned to do his one and only lap toward the end of the session. With Perez on provisional pole, however, Leclerc lost it rather violently and put his Ferrari into the wall with less than two minutes left. By the time race control red flagged the session, it was too late to restart. Verstappen would end up P9 with Bottas in P10 based on their Q2 lap times.

While this was disappointing for Bottas and Alfa Romeo, who thought P4 was within reach, it certainly made it more exciting to have the championship leader start from P9 with Perez starting from pole. After all, Perez’s domination at Baku gave us renewed hope that he could mount a worthy challenge for the championship.

As the cars all sat on the grid, ready to race, the event organizers tried a new driver introduction format, seemingly inspired by the WWE. LL Cool J hosted the procession, where each driver walked out of a tunnel and was introduced to the crowd with a quick backstory. Meanwhile, wil.i.am played a new song he wrote for F1. It was extremely American and probably not something we’ll ever see again. The drivers didn’t like being paraded around just minutes before lights out, when they’d otherwise be huddling with their race engineers in final preparation for the race. But it’s certainly fine to experiment with ways to improve the F1 spectacle.

If Verstappen hadn’t started from P9, the race would have been quite boring. Instead, we got to witness one of the greatest talents F1 has ever known slice his way through the field—including a fantastic double overtake on Leclerc and Magnussen—during his first stint on hard tires. Showing his maturity, the Dutchman actually fell back a couple places at the start, likely avoiding a first-lap incident that could have ruined his race. He’s just so confident in the Red Bull’s pace that he knows a couple places at the start won’t change the outcome.

The Red Bull driver is an absolute magician when it comes to tire management, as he was still clocking fastest laps on a very used set of hards. He pitted for mediums and returned to the track with fresh tires and mere a 1.8-second deficit to Perez with about nine laps left. He quickly closed this down, overtook Perez without drama and proceeded to put another five seconds into Checo before the checkered flag. Pretty much ending any hopes of a close battle for the championship this season.

Overall, the 2023 Miami Grand Prix was a big improvement on its debut. The facility and paddock are great places to experience the F1 spectacle, and the whole weekend served up some great on-track action, including several avoidable crashes from Leclerc that are certain to shake the Ferrari driver’s confidence. As F1 destinations go, Miami in early May is tough to beat.