I don’t mean to be all “I was into them before they were big,” but I’ve been following Formula 1 since the only way I could find out what happened in a race was the back of Autoweek magazine. I didn’t have cable, but I had that subscription starting in middle school. I remember reading about Ayrton Senna’s famous championship-deciding collision at the 1989 Japanese Grand Prix, trying to convince my friends at school that it was a huge deal.
Thus began decades of quiet, blinky stares in response to my F1 soliloquies: its mercurial drivers, the cars’ crazy tech, the teams’ brazen cheating. Not many people cared about Grand Prix racing in the U.S. in the ‘90s. Or the aughts. Or the twenty-teens...
It’s a lot more fun to love F1 now. Since Netflix’s Drive to Survive nailed its debut timing during the pandemic, lots of Americans are fans. In fact, according to Motorsport Network’s Global F1 Survey, the U.S. is now the sport’s fastest-growing market. I can attest! My family probably used to think Formula 1 was a shampoo; now I have to beg them not to text spoilers to the group chat. My sister even took her husband to the U.S. Grand Prix to celebrate a milestone birthday.
F1 is not a low-emissions pastime. You might encourage me to switch my allegiance to Formula E, the new-ish, all-electric racing series, but a) it sucks, and b) electrifying the cars only addresses a smidgeon of the sport’s overall emissions. Yes, the turbocharged hybrid V6 engines burn a lot of gas as they speed around tracks. But there are only 20 of them, racing around 4,500 miles apiece over the course of a year, getting 7 miles per gallon. Some heavy-duty trucks are similarly fuel-thirsty.
It’s the show that brings the heat. Teams criss-cross the globe over the season’s nine months and 24 races. They use private planes, big rigs, and an array of shipping methods to move not just cars, but entire trackside garages, luxurious mobile hospitality buildings, and even fuel labs in which to mix location-specific gas. According to F1 itself, while the racing is responsible for around 2,000 metric tons of CO2e per season (less than 1% of its total), the logistics of producing a season of Formula 1 races makes more than 100,000 metric tons. That’s equivalent to the total annual emissions of more than 6,000 Americans.
This is a petro-sport: Just watch a race and you’ll see. Every car proudly wears the branding of some oil company. Even the safety barriers are emblazoned with the Saudi Aramco marque. Though an F1 race engine is far more efficient than any internal combustion mill on the road, and advances in its hybrid system could trickle-down to road cars (manufacturers participate in racing to experiment with new tech), the sport is a drill-baby-drill love fest that spares no carbon or financial expense to celebrate burning fuel to go fast.
There are even talks of abandoning the current V6 system for simpler V8 engines that emphasize their use of synthetic fuel—all under the guise of furthering the development of this “sustainable” gas. Sure, synthetic fuel does not come out of the ground, but it still creates tailpipe emissions; its main advantage is that the same companies who get $4 a gallon to make today’s dino juice are the ones poised to make and distribute non-extractive fuel. It’s greenwash, and I should probably be using my influence to effect a boycott of e-fuel’s premium showcase: Formula 1.
This is a petro-sport: Just watch a race and you’ll see. Every car proudly wears the branding of some oil company. Even the safety barriers are emblazoned with the Saudi Aramco marque.
But I’m not. Whenever there’s a race, I rearrange my weekend to watch it. I text my family and friends, encouraging them to tune in. I want to take my dad to a Grand Prix, and because of where we both live, we’ll have to fly. I’m using my consumer powers for the forces of oil.
In fact, the only way I’ve argued against the continuation of the status quo is one podcast appearance in which I advocated for a greening up of the sport’s operations: more renewables powering the venues, plant-based concessions, and a calendar that prioritizes efficient logistics.
I know that some F1 heavies were listening to that show, and maybe some of them are reading this, too; it’s all I’ve got. Because, no, I’m not going to stop watching F1—especially not this season (which, if you’re asking, is really good). But my love of this dirty sport is a good reminder that consumer power matters; I’ll make F1 my guilty pleasure and try to maximize my spending impact everywhere else. I invested in solar panels and a heat pump, I eat mostly plants, and I'll never buy another gas-powered car.
Is this good enough? I don’t know. Besides, having a diversion like F1 helps keep my brain focused on climate action while I’m at work. It’s an imperfect arrangement, but imperfect is the sweet spot. We engage in climate action because we’re fighting to preserve the lives we love: cool summer nights, fresh food, homes safe from disasters, and yeah, sports.
Now I’m off to make some popcorn and re-watch that 1989 Japanese Grand Prix. I love the sound of that Honda V10 😬.
