The blurred lines between Drive to Survive and actual Formula One

Lando Norris of Great Britain driving the (4) McLaren MCL39 Mercedes on track during day one of F1 Testing at Bahrain International Circuit on February 26, 2025 in Bahrain, Bahrain. (Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

By Craig Ray

27 Feb 2025

Formula One has two season launches these days – one for the hit TV series Drive to Survive and another for the actual racing.

In a world awash with sports documentaries serving as marketing tools for a sport, it’s sometimes difficult to ascertain if fans are looking forward to the actual events, or the retold, packaged telling of them.

In Formula One, the lines are as blurred as chevrons from inside the cockpit at 330km/h. The new season of the hit show Drive to Survive starts on 7 March, which covers the 2024 season, just days before the actual 2025 campaign kicks off.

Fan sites and social media platforms have been buzzing with anticipation of season 7 of the documentary, underlining the popularity and quality of the series.

There is no doubt Drive to Survive has elevated the stature of Formula One from a sport almost exclusively for petrolheads, to a drama for the entire family.

Team principals are in some cases bigger household names than the drivers.

Even mechanics are reaping the rewards of the show. Red Bull Racing’s “technician” Calum Nicholas, one of only a few black people in any team, released a book, Life in the Pitlane, last month.

The documentary has given Nicholas enough exposure, and presumably interest, to warrant a book.

In a recent interview with The Times, to promote the launch of his book, Nicholas noted that when he rewatched the first few seasons of Drive to Survive, he realised that because of his ethnicity, he really stood out in the few minutes of screen time he had.

“It is a difficult one, because my ethnicity isn’t something I did, it is just me,” Nicholas told The Times.

“It is a hard one to cope with and it took me a little while to appreciate that a huge part of trying to make the paddock a more inclusive place is just giving people representation.

“What I didn’t want was for people to say, ‘Oh well, F1 must be really inclusive, look at Calum’. My success within the sport, in many ways, was against the odds.”

Drive to Survive F1 Red Bull technician Calum Nicholas in the garage during qualifying ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of Japan at Suzuka International Racing Course on 6 April 2024. (Photo: Kym Illman / Getty Images)

Formula One owners Liberty Media, who acquired the sport in 2017, have been tactical and inventive in promoting it. Drive to Survive was their biggest masterstroke.

The ubiquitous Netflix boom mic is ever-present in the F1 paddock these days, recording almost every conversation of importance to ensure the show remains a hit.

Teams have no editorial control of the series, although they can ban cameras from showing technical aspects of their cars, or where there are commercial clashes.

Despite all the access, the show is naturally edited to portray the sport in its most positive light, because, rather than being a gritty tell-all independent series, it’s a promotional tool for the sport.

A hugely entertaining and well-crafted piece of promotion for sure, but it would still fall under the banner of “marketing” in the company organogram.

And that’s not a criticism. There have probably only been a handful of better marketing campaigns in sports history.

The success has seen sports such as golf, tennis, and athletics follow suit, in a drive to bring the human element, the tensions, highs and struggles of athletes to the worldwide audience.

Lewis Hamilton drives the Scuderia Ferrari SF-25 on day two of F1 testing at Bahrain International Circuit on 27 February 2025. (Photo: Rudy Carezzevoli / Getty Images)

Lando Norris in the McLaren MCL39 Mercedes on day one of F1 testing at Bahrain International Circuit on 26 February 2025. (Photo: Clive Mason / Getty Images)

Sport for all

As a result of the show’s appeal, Formula One has skyrocketed in popularity, as much for being a social event as a sports contest.

Tickets for race days are harder to come by, sponsorship revenue is climbing and more cities, including Cape Town, want to host Grands Prix.

“It is clear that people want to invest in this,” South African Sports Minister Gayton McKenzie said in an interview last month.

“We have also gotten some promising news that Holland is not coming back, so we might be getting that space in 2027.”

According to an analysis by sports business publication Sportico, the average value of an F1 team rose by 44% between 2023 and 2024 to $2.21-billion (R42.66-billion).

As a comparison, the value of the entire South African rugby ecosystem, including the Springboks, is a little more than R2-billion annually.

And on a more personal level, Nicholas’s story is a snapshot of the changing face of F1, which for many years was an exclusive “old boys” type club.

Thanks largely to Drive to Survive, it’s now much more widely watched and understood. And as a consequence, much more diverse.

Not only in racial terms but also in gender and crossover appeal to casual sports fans.

The series also helped Formula One gain extensive traction in the US, a market the sport always failed to penetrate meaningfully.

Lando Norris during day one of F1 testing at Bahrain International Circuit on 26 February 2025. (Photo: Clive Mason / Getty Images)

New season

On the track, the new editions of Formula One cars had their first official outings in Bahrain this week and the results were inconclusive.

McLaren’s Lando Norris was fastest on day one of testing but there is still much refinement to take place before the opening Grand Prix of the year in Melbourne on 16 March.

“It was a good, fun day on track, and we progressed through a lot of the tests that we wanted to do,” Norris said after day one of testing. “I’m looking forward to pushing the car a bit more over the next couple of days.”

Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton got through 70 laps in his first proper outing for Ferrari and was fifth fastest.

“Testing is always exciting,” Hamilton said. “It’s the first time you get to see what everyone has been developing and can start to get a feel for your own car and the year ahead.

“Being here with Scuderia Ferrari HP and in the SF-25 for the first time is an incredible feeling. Our focus right now is on experimenting with different things, gathering as much data as possible and getting familiar with the car, and we’ve already learned a lot.

“It’s too early to really understand performance, but everything feels good and as a team we’re working on the best way to optimise each run.

“There’s more to do over the next few days to get through our programme and understand the car to the best of our ability, but right now I’m looking forward to getting out there again tomorrow.” DM

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