She’s in charge: At the F1 Miami Grand Prix, many top executive roles are held by women

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — For the Miami Grand Prix, someone is in charge of all the strategic planning and the budget. Someone else oversees the construction of 163 temporary buildings needed for a Formula 1 race weekend. Someone else designs the seating areas and keeps track of food and beverage needs. Someone else makes sure that the rich and famous have everything they need and want, from the right drink to the right kind of throw pillow.

These jobs make the race happen.

And in Miami, they’re all being done by women.

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It’s something that the Miami Grand Prix believes sets its race apart. In a sport and a circuit still dominated by males — there hasn’t been a woman behind the wheel for a Formula 1 race since 1992 — it will be difficult this weekend to find an element of the event that isn’t overseen by a woman.

“I’m so proud,” said Katharina Nowak, the Miami race’s vice president of business operations. “The amount of talent, whether male or female, that we have in that room, it just makes you want to be better. Every day, we push ourselves to just continue to maintain the standard at which we all expect to be working at, which just pushes everybody to be better for each other because no one wants to let anyone down.”

The women leading the way

There are men on the masthead for the race’s local overseers: Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross owns the race, Tom Garfinkel is the managing partner and Tyler Epp is president of the race that takes place at the Dolphins’ Hard Rock Stadium campus. From there, many other top Miami roles are held by women, including:

— Nowak — only 28 years old — reports to Epp as the race’s second-in-command and oversees all strategic plans, the budget and 17 internal departments. She also speaks four languages.

— Natalie Clark is the senior director of event operations, overseeing the process of building, loading in and loading out, which means she tracks what every truck is bringing onto the campus and where it goes.

— Sydney McClain is the senior director of events and food and beverage, meaning she creates virtually the entire fan experience on the 250-acre campus.

— Melanie Cabassol is vice president of hospitality and curated experiences, meaning she creates the atmosphere for premium clients — a list that in past years has included the likes of LeBron James, Patrick Mahomes, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.

“I’ve worked at other places before, and it hasn’t been that I’m sitting around a conference table and a majority of women are driving different initiatives within this business,” McClain said. “So, it is very unique. It’s very exciting. And I think that we owe a lot of that to the female leaders that have been here, been in our shoes before, and that have helped pave the way for us.”

The race’s impact on Miami

The race, now in its fourth year, is part of a diverse series of events at the Hard Rock campus. It’s primarily the home of the Dolphins, who have their training facility adjacent to the stadium. It also plays host to Miami Hurricanes football, concerts, soccer — the Club World Cup later this year and the FIFA World Cup next year will hold some matches there — and the Miami Open tennis tournament. The F1 race alone has generated more than $1 billion in economic impact in its first three years.

The women leading the Miami race aren’t alone in their fields. At F1, the chief commercial officer is Emily Prazer and, until late last year, Sacha Woodward Hill had been there for nearly 30 years as the chief legal officer.

But Miami stands out, said Susie Wolff, the managing director of F1 Academy — an all-female developmental racing series.

“I think it’s something which we can all take quite an amount of pride in, that the sport has shifted in such a way that it’s now the case that it is not regarded as something unusual,” Wolff said. “I don’t see it as unusual. I think is a testament to the progress we’ve made.”

How it happens in Miami

This week in Miami takes the other 51 weeks on the calendar to prepare for. Eight months of planning, three months of executing the plan and then one month of it all actually happening.

Part of Clark’s job, along with overseeing 245 tent structures and 110 generators and 35 miles of plumbing infrastructure — all of it temporary and hidden — also is to work with architects and construction companies who execute what she draws up for a plan.

“I think when I was younger in my career, I got a little bit of, ‘Who is she? Why is she in the meeting? Why does she have these construction plans?’” Clark said. “And what happens over time is they hear you speak, your confidence, and once people understand that you are a master at your craft, there’s less questions being asked.”

Cabassol leaves nothing to chance in her job. She’s in charge of the most luxurious spaces on the campus, the Palm Club, the Casa Tua Trackside Club and the 72 Club. The original blueprints for those spaces were her vision. Every glass, every bottle of Champagne, every element of those spaces gets her approval.

They call her group a “white glove team,” VIP service for VIP guests. She even manages a secret road of sorts on the campus — Palm Alley, they call it, a palm tree-lined path that drops off some of the world’s richest people 10 feet from the entrance. Inside the club, there are the strictest of rules: no entourages, no private security, the VIP and one guest only. No cameras, no media.

Cabassol and her group know the likes and dislikes, what kind of food, what kind of drink, every guest will want ahead of time by dealing with the VIPs’ own teams. If there is a Palm Club guest who doesn’t like another Palm Club guest, they even have a plan to keep those people away from each other. Everybody must enjoy themselves, no matter what.

She makes it work. So do Nowak, Clark, McClain and many others.

“What has happened here is they’ve brought the right people together to create, the right team to execute the vision,” Cabassol said. “I guess I would say I’m proud to represent women in this space, but I’m even more proud to be a part of the team that recognizes and elevates talent that collaboratively work together in this environment.”

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AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing