The world was a very different place when the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship first started at Silverstone Circuit 75 years ago. The cars, of course, are scarcely recognisable from the single-seater Grand Prix racers that charged around the track; technology has transformed the sport into one of the most visually stunning on television; champions have come and gone; and motor racing is more global than ever before. But in the purest of senses, the asphalt that winds its way through 3.66 miles of Northamptonshire countryside, some things do in fact stay the same: the Silverstone racetrack itself has stood the test of time better than almost anything else in the hallowed world of Formula 1.
At the centre of it all, few figures have been as instrumental in shaping Silverstone’s past, present and future as Stuart Pringle. As managing director of Silverstone Circuit, Pringle stands at the intersection of motorsport tradition and innovation, guiding the iconic track through a transformative period in its long and illustrious history. In a role that demands both commercial sharpness and a deep reverence for racing heritage, Pringle has proven himself to be the ideal custodian of Britain’s home of motorsport.
Since stepping into the top job in 2016, Pringle has overseen an ambitious evolution of Silverstone. From securing the long-term future of the British Grand Prix to spearheading multi-million-pound infrastructure projects, including the state-of-the-art Silverstone Experience museum and the recently launched Escapade trackside accommodation, he has played a significant role in ensuring the circuit remains relevant in a fast-changing industry.
Pringle’s connection to motorsport runs deeper than boardroom strategy. The former British Army officer in the Royal Tank Regiment was an “undiagnosed petrolhead” at school, who is now living the dream by heading up one of the most prestigious names in motorsport. He’s known to be a genuine advocate for fans, Formula 1, and the broader motorsport community.
We sit down with Pringle to delve into his journey from military service to motorsport executive, explore the challenges and triumphs that have defined his leadership, and look ahead to what’s next for Silverstone under his watch.
Silverstone Circuits Ltd managing director, Stuart Pringle
Ben Winstanley: I think the best place to start would be to reflect on the 75th anniversary of Formula 1 at Silverstone. What does that mean to you and the motorsport community?
Stuart Pringle: That is a great place to start. It's a great honour to currently head up the circuit where the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship first started 75 years ago – we're very proud of the sport’s history and the way that it has helped shape Silverstone. We haven't hosted all 75 rounds that Great Britain has run, but we've certainly hosted the vast majority of them. I believe it’s 59, if my maths are correct, and I've personally been here for around 20 of them.
We certainly feel the weight and importance of history, but we're also very mindful that we can't be slavishly tied to it. Motorsport in general, but Formula One in particular, is about the most forward-looking sport you'll ever come across, so the most important race is the next one, not the last one. We're very much set on making sure that our circuit is fit for the next 75 years, that we're producing a product that Formula One and the fans – be they arriving at Silverstone to watch the race in person or are watching on the television – are excited to watch year after year.
But it’s a very special place. I’m sure the brand-new circuits look at us with deep envy because we’re able to point to the black and white photos on our boardroom wall and trace this great sport back to its origins. There've been some remarkable sporting moments at Silverstone over the years and, with any luck, there’ll be many more in its future.
BW: There are many historic racetracks that fail to pass muster in the modern age of motorsport, especially the direction of travel for Formula 1 with its much larger car footprint. What is it about Silverstone that continues to attract the great and good of motorsport to the circuit?
SP: I think first and foremost, it's a very quick track. It's just fast! Big long straights; sweeping corners; very few hairpins and tight bends. It’s always been fast and it always will be.
Much of it started life as the perimeter road on an airfield and it's a quirk of circumstance that what was a few pencil lines on an old airfield chart with some hay bales and oil barrels to mark out the track has actually stayed pretty much the same and it continues to be the same fast circuit in the modern age. The fact that for many of these corners – if you’re Ollie Bearman in his first full season of Formula 1 this year – you are genuinely racing in Stirling Moss’ wheeltracks. That’s something very special. It's pretty much the same track that every racing great has tackled over the years.
So to answer your question, I think the reason everybody likes coming to Silverstone is it's a proper driver's circuit. If you want to set a quick time in qualifying at Silverstone, you give an extra tug on your belts and take a deep breath because it's big boy stuff around here – it really is about bravery. Bring a lot of speed and you'll set a fast time, it’s as simple as that. These modern cars work very well when they go quickly because they've got a lot of air going over them, and that makes them even more spectacular. It's always been somewhere that's been demanding and it's no less so today. I think it would be fair to say it's a different test to 75 years ago, but it's certainly no less demanding.
There’s a certain irony that CAD-designed circuits, with all the computing power and engineering knowhow of today, can’t seem to produce circuits that are as fundamentally exciting as this old one.
BW: I think you're right. Somehow against the odds, this track has stood up to every generation of Formula One car that has travelled across its asphalt. But I think there is also that additional element, which is the British racing public – a more knowledgeable and vociferous bunch you couldn't possibly hope to meet. With that in mind, perhaps you could tell me a little bit about what are the demands of a race course of this size from such a vocal fanbase?
SP: Well, you're absolutely right. We are very lucky in this country to have this tremendous indigenous fanbase that's proliferated over the past 75 years – that's what consistently hosting a round of the World Championship gives you. We've also got this whole new army of fans who've joined since the pandemic and getting hooked on Netflix’s Drive to Survive.
That’s been transformational for all promoters of Formula One races and it's been very impactful in this country, too, despite the fact that actually the Great British public knew about us already; that combination together makes for a great great dynamic.
Silverstone's a big site, we get a lot of people in here. It does produce its fair share of operational challenges. We've got about the same number of seats as Wembley Stadium, 92,000, but ours are spread out over three and a half miles, and we fill in the gaps with lots of other people as well, to the point where there will be 165,000 people at Silverstone on Sunday 4th July for the Grand Prix – and a lot of those spectators will come on Saturday and Friday and even before the racing starts on Thursday. We'll have more people on site on Thursday than a good number of the Grand Prixs have in their race day attendance on Sunday, with Sam Fender performing that night.
Many of them come and spend the weekend. Now we have this wonderful sort of festival atmosphere with about 55,000 people camping. We like that for a number of reasons, but not least because it takes some traffic off the road on race day, and that's helpful. We are fundamentally a Greenfield site without any immediate public transport links, but Exhibit A for the challenges that we're trying to overcome is getting people in and out. So, for example, we run an extensive busing operation, including different start points around the country from local railway stations or from a number of park and ride locations. We’re renting 600 double-decker buses to move fans in and out.
So, 55,000 people camping, 480,000 people over the weekend. That's a lot of water drunk, a lot of trips to the loo, a lot of everything – my life's a lot about portaloos and car parking, far more than fast cars, champagne and private jets, I can tell you!
BW: The festival side of things has snowballed over the last few years. It's a bit of a chicken and egg situation, I can imagine, as the more people who camp, the more atmosphere is naturally generated. But the idea of this big four-day festival seems to have grown pretty organically. In fact, I think it's become one of the best selling points of Silverstone as a race week experience. Who really took the bull by the horns and said, “Do you know what, we have the people on site, we have the capacity to do this.” What was the thinking and why go to all this additional effort?
SP: Formula One under Liberty Media's ownership has got a very clear strategic direction of travel. They want the championship to become the biggest sports and entertainment property in the world, full stop. The wider entertainment piece didn't used to be part of the conversation, for all that we pretty much invented music at the races. We’ll be acknowledging that a bit this year with a tribute to Eddie Jordan, who died earlier this year, because actually it was him bashing around on the drums with some of his mates and a few drivers on a curtained lorry that was really the start of it all 30 years ago.
Originally it was a traffic control measure to delay people's exit, but Formula 1 has encouraged every promoter to really pull out all the stops and create a distinct identity for each race. We can't compete with Singapore or Las Vegas for a downtown street race, we can't have the setting sun over the desert as per Abu Dhabi, but we can do a British summer festival and actually that suits us for the operational reasons I’ve already mentioned and, of course, there's a commercial advantage as well. But I think you've rather put your finger on it when you said it’s created this fantastic atmosphere which people don’t want to miss out on again in future years. The more that we invest in the broader entertainment, the quality of the music, the peripheral activities around the day, the higher the percentage of people coming back year on year.
We're creating something special here, people feel it and they want to be part of it. Coming to the British Grand Prix is not the cheapest weekend that people are going to have. The tickets are expensive and it's critical that we as the promoter make sure that they represent good value for money and we pack a lot into those tickets. I'm committed to providing that value for money and everything that we're packaging up nowadays is something that people are going “Wow, we I want to go and do that again next year. That was mind blowing.”
BW: What is it this year that you're hoping to achieve? What are your key considerations when you sit down as a collective and go, right, what do we do better this time around?
SP: We're very proud of our music lineup this year, it's probably the strongest we've ever had: Sam Fender, RAYE, Fat Boy Slim, and Becky Hill on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, respectively. And they're just the headliners on each night. There's some fantastic support to artists and yet more artists down in the second stage that we introduced last year for the first time, Made at Vale Stage, which is a really fun giant tent that takes over 10,000 people. So, evolving the music has been very satisfying. It seems to be well received. We know it's well received because you can see when people buy their tickets, the point at which they decide to come.
The wider evolution is probably things that people wouldn't naturally notice if we're getting it right, it should just seem seamless, but we've moved the fan zone slightly. It's really, really unglamorous but things like foul drainage, data cabling, water and backup power, all the things that if they're not there you’d notice. Also, Wi-Fi at Gates for scanning tickets, we've got a 5G network that's going in one area this year and it'll be across the site by next year's Grand Prix. So quite a lot of operational nuts and bolts.
Right in the heart of things, we've also built a new karting circuit over the winter. It's not open yet, it opens this October, but it means now that we'll have a lot of people going to our mainstage area, walking across the karting circuits, seeing them for the first time.
I want to tell you that is that the site evolves, we need to move things around. Do you know the things that we change a lot are probably the things that people nobody would know.Because if it's smooth, then you'll you've got a better chance of having a good day. And if you have a good day, you'll come again.
BW: How will you be marking the 75th anniversary of Formula 1 at Silverstone?
SP: Well, actually, our major celebration of the 75 years of the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship is at the Silverstone Festival, which is our big historic meeting which takes place in the August Bank Holiday weekend. We will assemble more than 35 World Championship winning cars. It will be the biggest single collection of F1 Championship winning cars from across the ages ever gathered, I believe. That's going to be incredibly exciting because the cars are spread out very nicely through the decades, so you’ll see the evolution of Formula One, the design changes, the engineering advances, the brands that have come and gone be they sponsors or manufacturers.
There'll be some bits and bobs at the British Grand Prix, but when I spoke at the beginning about F1 being a sport that looks forward that’s pretty much the point. There's not going to be a long and illustrious parade of 75 cars at this year's race, but we're doing that at one where we think the audience is perhaps a bit more appropriate for it.
BW: One of the big things that certainly regular racegoers will notice over the last few years will have been the arrival of this slightly strange looking kind of amalgam of buildings, which we now know is called Escapade Silverstone. Tell me more about the opening of this amazing new accommodation concept?
SP: They are indeed cutting edge. Nobody's built trackside luxury accommodation at a proper Grand Prix circuit. There are some private driving club circuits in the United States but nothing like this exists at a proper Grand Prix circuit. They're unique, they're eye-catching, they're extremely well appointed. They're the most extraordinary experience when you stand on the balcony and watch a Formula One car go underneath you. I mean, you're almost touching the chassis and looking into the cockpit. It's a view like nothing else as the cars exit out of the world famous Copse corner where Verstappen and Hamilton had that coming together in 2021.
Then there's The Gallery restaurant, which is sort of the mother ship with an amazing roof terrace, 120-seater restaurant, striking views, the restaurant’s open seven days a week, year round. And I think that’s a really important aspect of this new proposition: Escapade is not just about Formula One weekend, although it's going to be exceptionally memorable for those who are standing on those balconies, but actually it's giving us another 184 ensuite bedrooms to help support the conference and exhibition business that we have developed using our paddock facilities for the rest of the year.
We have the Hilton Hotel, which is opposite The Wing and now joined by a footbridge, that's that's 200 beds or so. That means we're not too far off 400 beds on site that people can rent, which allows us to attract some pretty sizable clients given the scale of our halls and our conference and exhibition areas.
Today, for example, we have the Italian Porsche Club who've driven over from Italy for a track day and are staying at Escapade. Many or most of our clients have got a few pounds to spend, they've got nice cars and they don't want to be slumming it in the local budget hotel down the road.
So it's not just about the big high days and holidays, it's about year round – it opens up that Formula One lifestyle to all fans. So you can come in February, when it’s pretty good value to stay the night, stand in your pyjamas on your private balcony overlooking the Silverstone Grand Prix circuit. It's a really exciting proposition.
BW: There aren’t many motor racing experiences as complete as Silverstone for amateur racers, let alone for the pros. As you say, it’s a 365-day proposition.
SP: Well, it's all part of our evolution of the business from being just a one Sunday in July business to becoming a 52-week per year leisure and business destination sitting under a globally recognised motorsport brand. That's been our strategy for the last decade or so. You don't need to be the greatest student of motor racing history to know that Silverstone had some up and down years in previous decades and much of those challenges came from the fact that we really were wholly reliant on the British Grand Prix every year. But now we have a much more diverse business.
Who knew I could get so excited about conferences and exhibitions? But they are a great complementary activity through the winter months. They work so well with motor racing, because conferences and exhibitions don't take place in the summer, but that's fine because we're flat out with motor racing then, but they do take place over the winter months.
We really like what we're trying to do here. It’s not dissimilar to what just about every other sports venue is looking to do. For example, Tottenham Hotspurs Stadium, being probably the exemplar, but it's somewhere people can go outside of match day where there are multiple activities and experiences.
We'll be opening a tour product where you can get a behind the scenes authentic F1 tour next year. As I already mentioned, our kart circuit will open this October, which will be an international standard kart circuit capable of hosting European and world finals in not too many years’ time, hopefully, but also where people like you and me can go racing with mates or you can bring your kids and let them have a first taste of how exciting it is to get behind the wheel. Even our corporate guests will do a lot of karting because it's a very accessible way of people getting a genuinely authentic driving experience at Silverstone.
We have our museum on site, which tells the history of Silverstone and also explains the science and the engineering behind it and brings that all to life with a big, strong educational focus – bringing a different demographic, multi generational family groups that are keen to learn about science, technology, engineering and maths. So all manner of different things and all of that is now sitting on top of our traditional driving experiences where you can come and drive our car.
BW: What about your own motor racing experience. Are you a racer yourself or are you very much a spectator first and foremost?
SP: Absolutely. I did briefly have a racing licence, but I didn't exercise it at all frequently, so that was not really worth hanging onto. Now I'm a motor sport administrator who has fallen into this through a love of the sport, turned his hobby into his day job, but I wouldn't ever kid myself that I’m a racer. I drive the circuit several times a week, but normally at about 10 miles an hour or less looking for maintenance issues!
I’ll potter around, chatting to our hard working venue team who keep the place looking immaculate year round. It's not going to help the business go any faster if I indulge my fantasy and pretend I am Ayrton Senna, that's just deluded. But I do feel very lucky to come to Silverstone every day. It's an inspiring place to work.
BW: Could you tell me a little bit more about how you ended up here in the first place?
SP: Well, 25 years ago I had a bit of a career change and I landed in motorsport, initially running a club called the Vintage Sports Car Club, which is one of the most active and long standing motor clubs in the country. And still puts on an incredible number of events for pre-war and immediately post-war cars. Then I did a stint at Brands Hatch looking after the motor sport events of that group of circuits. Then I came to Silverstone to run the British Racing Drivers Club, which I did for about nine years and then moved across to its subsidiary company. Silverstone Circuits Limited, which I did a couple of years as a director there and then started heading it up about 8 years ago.
I did a degree in estate management but decided not to become a chartered surveyor, preferring instead to become a tank commander and joined the Royal Tank Regiment, did that for five years, left, and fell into motorsport.
They certainly didn’t tell me things would pan out like this in the careers office. I was an undiagnosed petrolhead at school and it was absolutely ridiculous that nobody could spot that this child should have been steered towards his hobby and passion. I have not had a problem getting out of bed any day in the last 25 years.
I started work at 4am this morning because there's a lot to get done. You know, I'm 25 years in and I still can't wait to get cracking.
BW: Could you tell us your favourite Formula 1 race?
SP: It's a Lewis Hamilton win, but it's his first one at Silverstone rather than his most recent one. I mean, they've all been amazing in their own way. And, goodness me, do we owe that guy a debt of thanks for the way that he's built the enthusiasm and excitement at the British Grand Prix.
In fact, Hamilton and I had this lovely conversation as he was leaving last year. I wanted to thank him for all he's done over the years, but was very quick to acknowledge the role Silverstone has played in his career. It's not just the victories, it's the fans that come here every year to see him that has helped create this mystique and myth around Silverstone. We really bound together and thrived off each other's energy, this sort of tripartite: the fans, the driver and the venue. And together we have all mutually benefited.
Anyway, my favourite memory, the one where I thought, “Oh my word, I've just witnessed greatness, was his first win at the 2008 British Grand Prix. It absolutely lashed it down, his teammate Heikki Kovalainen beat him in qualifying, but Lewis just drove an absolute masterclass to win by over a minute from Nick Heidfeld in the BMW Sauber. I mean, who wins by over a minute in Formula One? It's just unheard of in the modern sport.
Everybody else fell off the track left, right and centre and the guy's car control and raw pace, still just pulling away, we all just stood there and could hardly believe what we had just witnessed.
Funnily enough, normally, you get a few letters after the Grand Prix weekend. “This wasn't right. That wasn't right. I wasn't happy with this.” But in 2008, we received virtually no complaints. People were soaked to the skin mud everywhere, but it was just the most extraordinary day out. It was incredible. And that started the Lewis Hamilton myth at Silverstone.
BW: What do we need to do as a sport to continue to attract fans? What are the demands of the modern motorsport fan?
SP: I don't think it matters how you come to the sport, I think once you're here and you become intoxicated by the adrenaline, the excitement that comes from watching brave people battle at 200mph, I think you’re hooked for life. Provided that level of spectacle continues to be served up and the overall experience, if you’re treated well and you’re provided with value for money, hopefully we'll keep the fans invested in this incredible sport.
Any sports promoter will tell you that we're very lucky to have 20% of the grid of Brits – 25% if you claim Alex Albon. That's not a total coincidence. You know, the British Racing Driver's Club spends a lot of time and effort trying to make sure that this young talent is coming through. It's not solely responsible for any of the drivers on the grid. George Russell and Lando Norris are certainly winners of the Young Driver of the Year award that the BRDC have supported for many years.
For now, the average age of our fans is dropping and that's good. The demographic’s evolving with many more females attending than previously – in fact 43% of last year's attendees at the British Grand Prix were women. Ethnically, I’d say the Formula 1 weekend looks a lot more like modern Britain than it ever used to, so that's hugely positive as well. And it's multi-generational. People are bringing their children and bringing their parents and they're enjoying it in different ways.
There's a Formula One new movie coming, which is due out this month. Now we're in June, which is very exciting. Brad Pitt has put all that together with the creators of Top Gun, and we feature very heavily in that, so that should hopefully attract a few more people to our circuit. And that will be, you know, that made by the makers of Top Gun that should be a resounding global box office hit. I would say Silverstone features heavily in that, so that’s obviously very exciting, too.
So it would be fair to say I’m pretty upbeat about the outlook. I’d put good money on this place having another 75-year future ahead of it.
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