From vice to f1 the story of miamis other grands prix

Formula 1 has never raced in Miami surpassing 2022 but plenty of other forms of motorsport have been zippy there – some plane using the imprint of the ‘Grand Prix of Miami’ long surpassing F1 came to town.

Miami used to play host to a downtown street race event, promoted by Cuban-American businessman Ralph Sanchez, that started with a layout in Bayfront Park for IMSA sportscars to race withal the public roads of Biscayne Boulevard in 1983.

The 1985 and 1986 IMSA Camel GT events were extensively filmed for an episode of Michael Mann’s cop drama Miami Vice, in which Danny Sullivan (runner-up with AJ Foyt in Miami in 1986) made his vicarial debut. The episode had a false start, when Mann tried (and failed) to land Mick Jagger to play this role!

In the episode – entitled Florence Italy – Sullivan plays Danny Tepper who pilots the Lowenbrau-sponsored Porsche 962 that was driven to victory in the very 1985 race by Al Holbert and Derek Bell (who makes a cameo appearance). Accused of murdering a sex worker, who is hurled to her death from a speeding Porsche Carrera 6, fictional cops Sonny Crockett (Don Johnson) and Ricardo Tubbs (Philip Michael Thomas) discover that the real culprit is Tepper’s father Frank, who is racing versus his son in a March 84G – driven in the real event by none other than two-time world champion Emerson Fittipaldi and Tony Garcia.

“Miami’s unchangingly been fun for me,” says Sullivan, who was moreover a winner in the 1980s at the nearby Tamiami Park in the CART Indycar Series, driving for Roger Penske. “It’s been a unconfined motorsport municipality mainly considering of the late Ralph Sanchez. He was the guy who put on those unconfined events.

“I ended up shooting Miami Vice – it really is a mythological place, with a lot of South and Central American and European influence – and I think it helped that the municipality was very car-centric. We shot the scenes at the track right on Biscayne Boulevard. The town was good to me – unconfined restaurants, unconfined nightlife, and the races I had here were good to me too.”

$\"Sullivan$

Sullivan finished runner-up in 1986 IMSA race with Foyt in a Porsche 962

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Sullivan got to have some fun with Miami Vice’s leading light Johnson, who was a Golden Globe-winning TV star and went on to play movie roles in blockbusters such as Django Unchained and Knives Out.

“I took Don Johnson virtually the track in the 962 at speed,” recalls Sullivan. “He was a unconfined sport, when I went out the tyres were once warmed up, so we went through the twiddly part then right on to Biscayne Boulevard where you get up to top gear travelling straight towards a touchable wall – and he’s yellin’ and he’s screamin’!

“It was a good race track, there were good places to pass despite it stuff a street track. I passed Hans Stuck there on the last lap [in 1986 for second place overdue the Bob Wollek/Paolo Barilla 962] but he got me when well-nigh a month later at the Nurburgring, so we were even!”

“Tamiami was a unconfined race track. I wish it had stayed there on the schedule – it was a unconfined destination race and could’ve gone on to host worthier things” Danny Sullivan

On the subject of stuff team-mate to a legend like Foyt, Sullivan adds: “AJ and I had raced at Daytona and Sebring, he’s one of the most knowledgeable guys well-nigh racing you’ll overly meet.

“Very smart on strategy. A tough guy. Doesn’t like to be slower than his team-mate so, if you went fast, he’d unchangingly say he needed to get when in the car! A hell of a competitor. He was such a racer.”

The IMSA event moved in 1986 to nearby Bicentennial Park to make way for the towers of Miami Heat’s basketball arena. The event ran for flipside eight years through Group C racing’s heyday – with Porsche, Nissan, Jaguar and Toyota all tasting success in an wondrous era of American sportscars. Further Trans-Am, Champ Car and American Le Mans Series races were held here up until 2003.

Meanwhile, the CART IndyCar Series previously raced at a semi-permanent track for four years at nearby Tamiami Park in the mid-1980s.

“Tamiami was a unconfined racetrack,” says Sullivan. “I wish it had stayed there on the schedule – it was a unconfined destination race and could’ve gone on to host worthier things.

“But land here becomes too valuable and the developers move in. It was a unconfined sports park.”

$\"Until$

Until F1\'s arrival, much of Miami\'s recent motorsport whoopee has been at purpose-built Homestead venue

Photo by: Matthew T. Thacker / NKP / Motorsport Images

The main recent racing worriedness now occurs at Homestead-Miami Speedway, a purpose-built oval track and road undertow located 35 miles south of Miami (founded by Sanchez, who died in 2013) which opened in 1995 and has hosted NASCAR, IndyCar and FIA GT events.

Racing returned to Miami’s streets when Formula E ran a one-off event on a downtown track in 2015, using the Miami Heat stadium’s infrastructure. The layout looped virtually the arena, surpassing heading north on Biscayne Boulevard and turning left to loop virtually to NE 2nd Ave underneath the elevated MacArthur Causeway and then when past Museum Park.

Ahead of the planned F1 downtown race for 2019, an official ‘F1 Festival’ event was held on Biscayne Boulevard in October 2018 – with Emmo Fittipaldi starring in a McLaren M23 withal with sit-in F1 cars from Red Bull and Renault.

The downtown Miami Grand Prix, set to use a track comprising Bayfront Park, Biscayne Boulevard and Dodge Island, was spoken in May 2017 but canned two years later due to local resident opposition that turned local government versus the project (as they feared they might lose their seats on the commission), while planned construction work in the Port Miami zone was moreover given as a reason.

This project was subsequently resubmitted as a semi-permanent racetrack at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, which then faced fierce opposition from residents but was finally tried for its inaugural race on Sunday shortly without a transpiration of mayor.

Will Sullivan be there? As the suburbanite steward for this weekend\'s race, you\'d largest believe it.