Two Formula 1 Paddock Club hosts led me and a few other guests to the main track of the Las Vegas Grand Prix for a tour of all 3.8 miles of the loop. It was 5 p.m. or so in Vegas, so it was just then getting dark, the city’s storied glitz and bombast snapping sharply into focus. The late November weather was perfect for the occasion—just cool enough to stunt with your leather jacket on. Fifteen of us piled onto the runway-like cargo bed of a large truck. The fans already seated in the stands, thrilled to be there hours before the race even begins, waved at us as we wound our way around the track.
Welcome to the F1 Grand Prix Las Vegas, where even the pregame is memorable. Even if you weren’t lucky enough to actually zoom around the track like I was, the sheer excitement was palpable everywhere you turned. You could feel it in the booming volcanic sound of the cars themselves, in the laser focus of the pit crews nursing the vehicles back to health at lightning speed, and, oddly enough, in the sheer abundance of sponsorship activations everywhere you turned.
These days, everyone wants in on Formula 1, which purports to be the world’s fastest-growing sport with a global fanbase of more than 827 million. That includes major companies like Disney, who launched an F1 merch collab in Vegas, and Monster Energy, who served up special driver-branded drinks. But perhaps most visible of all was Louis Vuitton, with the French luxury house announcing a 10-year global partnership with F1 in October 2024.
Thus far, that deal has manifested itself in the form of bespoke LV trunks that have housed the trophies for each race this season: a teal-and-pink striped version for the Miami Grand Prix; a yellow-and-green one at the Australian Grand Prix; and a black-and-white, checkered-flag-inspired spin for Vegas.
The trunks—handcrafted by artisans in Asnieres, a village just outside of Paris, as they have been since 1859—bring another element of pure luxury to a sport that’s teeming with it, where the cars themselves cost tens of millions to build and maintain, and three-day tickets for Vegas start at $875. When Max Verstappen—who soared to victory in the Grand Prix and inched closer to overtaking Lando Norris in the fight for the world title—lifted the vibrant trophy before the adoring crowd, the LV trunk behind him looked and felt truly worthy of a champion.
And yet, somehow, that wasn’t even Vuitton’s best placement of the weekend. That honor would go to the jaw-dropping leather LV racing suit worn by Beyoncé as she strolled the grounds with Jay-Z in tow. Heartstopping thrills, off-the-charts opulence, and a chance to glimpse the world’s greatest pop star? No wonder Louis Vuitton has entered the race.