Marco Bezzecchi
I was at Silverstone as Ferrari star Charles Leclerc won the 2026 F1 British Grand Prix, and what the track and Liberty Media thought about MotoGP all week was appalling.
Silverstone is the home of British motorsport, and has the privilege of hosting the top tier of two and also four-wheel racing each year. But while a record crowd flocked to Silverstone to attend round nine of the F1 season, the track notoriously struggles to draw fans to MotoGP.
Across the four days, Silverstone recorded a new all-time record for F1 after 564,000 fans hit the Northamptonshire venue. Silverstone also welcomed 175,000 fans for race day alone, as well as seeing 72,000 fans attend on Thursday despite there being no track action that day.
In contrast, MotoGP saw just 99,000 fans attend its three-day 2025 British GP at Silverstone – including seeing a meagre 40,500 fans walk through the turnstiles for race day. It marked a 20% fall compared to the 2024 edition and nearly 50% less than the race got a decade ago.
Silverstone blew its golden chance to use F1’s record crowds to advertise MotoGP
Arguably, there are few circuits on the MotoGP calendar that consistently yield better races than Silverstone, where Marco Bezzecchi won the British GP in 2025 after Fabio Quartararo retired. The rear ride height device on Quartararo’s Yamaha got stuck while he was leading.
Yet Silverstone’s appalling attendance figures for the 2025 MotoGP British GP can be tied to a raft of issues beyond the lack of promotion the race received. MotoGP foolishly scheduled the race for the same day as the 2024/25 Premier League campaign concluded, for example.
A lot of the fans who did attend the 2025 MotoGP British GP were also frustrated by the lack of event suppliers, as it was so close to the Isle of Man TT and many suppliers felt that was a safer pick. There should be no such excuse in 2026, as the MotoGP British GP is August 7-9.
Yet with less than a month to go until MotoGP hits Silverstone, many tickets remain on sale. And how Silverstone and Liberty Media, which owns MotoGP and F1, treated the two-wheel series at the Formula 1 British GP should have enraged most figures in the motorbike world.
Liberty Media and Silverstone could have utilised F1’s record-breaking attendance figures to promote MotoGP, with thousands of eyes shown what brilliant racing the championship and the track deliver. Instead, you could be forgiven for forgetting that Silverstone hosts MotoGP.
Bar the very infrequent brief advert played on the big screens – I only noticed one or two a day, at most, on each of the four days at the F1 British GP – Silverstone completely blew its golden chance to show a wider audience what they could see by attending a MotoGP race.
F1 will have obviously wanted the spotlight to be on its race and not on MotoGP. But given that Liberty Media owns both series, the odd advert around the track would not have hurt.
Instead, Silverstone would have surely benefitted had Liberty Media used F1’s record crowd to promote MotoGP. Instead, Silverstone will once again have to use covers over most of its grandstands to hide the fact that so few are actually needed when MotoGP comes to town.
As F1 also incorporated lengthy gaps between most of the on-track sessions at Silverstone, a window of opportunity was also there for MotoGP to promote its British GP by doing show-runs. But alas, MotoGP will be left licking its wounds and British fans should once again feel ashamed at the sight of empty grandstands while one of the best races all year takes place.
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