FORMULA 1 LAS VEGAS GRAND PRIX

The Las Vegas Grand Prix is three nights of Formula One in November on closed streets in Las Vegas: practice on the Thursday, qualifying on the Friday and the race at eight on the Saturday night, fifty laps of a circuit of 6.201 kilometres that runs down the Strip past the Sphere, Caesars Palace, the Bellagio, Paris and the Venetian. It was first run in 2023 and is to stay on the calendar until 2037.

The pits stand on a car park that Formula One bought for $240 million. The last time Las Vegas held a Grand Prix, the whole circuit was a car park.

The Car Park

Las Vegas had two Grands Prix before this one, as the Caesars Palace Grand Prix, in 1981 and 1982, each the last race of its season. The circuit was laid out in the car park of the Caesars Palace hotel: 3.650 kilometres, fourteen turns, run anticlockwise.

Alan Jones won the first for Williams. Nelson Piquet finished fifth and took the title, and needed fifteen minutes to recover from heat exhaustion afterwards. In 1982 Michele Alboreto won his first Grand Prix, for Tyrrell, and Keke Rosberg, also fifth, took the title. The crowds were small, and the circuit has been described as one of the worst Formula One has ever visited. IndyCars raced on it in 1983 and 1984, and then it was gone. The Forum Shops at Caesars and the Mirage stand on it now.

The present race was first run on 18 November 2023. It was the eleven hundredth Grand Prix of the World Championship, and the first run on a Saturday since South Africa in 1985. It began badly. In the first practice Carlos Sainz hit a loose drain cover, and the second was put back two and a half hours while the covers were checked; the spectators were turned out at half past one in the morning, with vouchers for $200, and a class action was brought for thirty-five thousand of them. The race, started at ten at night, went to Max Verstappen after the lead had changed hands again and again, with Charles Leclerc second and Sergio Pérez third; Pérez’s third place made Red Bull first and second in the drivers’ championship for the first time.

George Russell won from pole in 2024, at the head of a Mercedes one-two, and Verstappen came fifth and took his fourth title in a row. In 2025 Verstappen won again, and Lando Norris, second on the road, and Oscar Piastri were both disqualified for wear on the planks beneath their cars. In June 2026 the race was confirmed on the calendar until 2037.

The Strip Circuit

The circuit was drawn by Tilke GmbH, under Carsten Tilke, son of Hermann. Ground was broken in March 2022, and the track opened on 16 November 2023. Clark County gave Formula One the use of its roads for ten years. The first design had fourteen corners; a chicane made it seventeen.

The pits and paddock stand on the old car park, now a permanent part of the circuit. From there the lap runs down Koval Lane, round the Sphere, along Sands Avenue and onto the Strip, where the straight runs for 1.9 kilometres, more than a mile, past the hotels to the end. It is run anticlockwise.

Formula One compares the average speeds with those of Monza, its Temple of Speed. In 2025 Yuki Tsunoda was timed at 222.6 miles an hour at the end of the Strip, and Verstappen set the race lap record, 1:33.365.

Saturday Night

It is a Grand Prix that ends on a Saturday. In local time, the two practices are on the Thursday, at half past four and at eight; the last practice is at half past four on the Friday, and qualifying at eight that night. The race starts at eight on the Saturday. It started at ten in 2023 and 2024, and was brought forward to eight in 2025.

On the Thursday and the Friday the sessions are in the late afternoon and at night: the first begins at half past four, and the second, at eight, after dark. The cars come down the Strip between the hotels.

The seats run from general admission and the grandstands to the hospitality. The top of it is the Formula One Paddock Club, sold for the three days with open bars, walks down the pit lane, the paddock, and priority at the podium; within it are the team suites and House 44, which promises appearances from Lewis Hamilton.

The 2026 race, the twenty-first of twenty-three, runs from Thursday 19 to Saturday 21 November, with the race on the Saturday night. Qatar and Abu Dhabi follow it, and the season ends at Abu Dhabi on 6 December.

What to Know

It runs from the Thursday to the Saturday in the second half of November: in 2026, from 19 to 21 November, with practice and qualifying from half past four in the afternoon on the Thursday and the Friday, and the race at eight on the Saturday night. The 2027 dates have not been announced; the race is contracted to 2037.

Tickets, from general admission to grandstands and VIP packages, are sold by Formula One. The Paddock Club and the team suites are sold by F1 Experiences, Formula One’s official hospitality, by enquiry, for all three days.

Smart casual. Nothing is published, and the Court’s version is a jacket without a tie, proper trousers and proper shoes, and no logos. The race is at night.

Harry Reid International Airport is the city’s airport. The circuit and the hotels it passes, Caesars Palace, the Bellagio, Paris and the Venetian, are all in Paradise, on the Strip; stay on the Strip.

The mistake is to plan an early night. The race starts at eight on the Saturday, not on a Sunday afternoon, and on the first night in 2023 practice ran on until the crowd was sent out at half past one in the morning.

The Court

The Las Vegas Grand Prix is not the Court’s own. Places in the Paddock Club, or a team suite, are sought on a member’s behalf, and the Court arranges the whole of it: getting there, where to stay on the Strip, and the table afterward. The season ends a fortnight later in Abu Dhabi.

How one becomes a member is set out under Admission.