In this article, I will take you through my journey and share my thoughts on what made the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix 2023 such a great spectacle. And if you don’t get bored by the end (which you shouldn’t), you’ll get lots of valuable tips and tricks for planning your race trip as well!
Let’s go!
Well, let me give you some personal context. In 2021, I attended the Hungarian Grand Prix (a super nice experience!), and for 2023, my friends and I wanted to attend another race. I personally enjoy visiting new places and countries, and while researching the race calendar, I also came across news that Wizzair had introduced cheap direct flights from Bucharest to Jeddah.
Planning a trip from Europe to attend a race can be quite expensive (if you take into account the full journey, flight tickets, etc.) in places like Australia or South and North America, while countries in Europe are mostly easy to reach on a city break. We took the new flight route as a sign to choose the Grand Prix in Jeddah as our winner, cheering on the idea of the great adventure that would be visiting a new and exciting place that wouldn’t typically be a priority destination: Jeddah.
In summary, this article will detail my surprise at how well the event was structured, the beauty of Saudi Arabia, the kindness of the people there, and how everything was so perfect in terms of an F1 race. Everything was incredibly budget-friendly for the experience we had, and I highly recommend going to Jeddah to attend the Grand Prix if you’re into F1.
Now, let’s dive deep into the details for planning the trip and what made this event so special.
Before the event
The race tickets
I attended various sporting events and concerts over the past few years, and I’m used to things selling out quickly, so I usually try to stay on top of all the event announcements when I really want to attend. My strategy for the Grand Prix was actually super simple, but super effective: I started following the Instagram page for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, and most importantly, turned on notifications for everything they posted. This was a great way to see what they were planning for the event and not miss out on ticket sale announcements.
And then it happened! On December 2nd, I received a notification that tickets were on sale with a limited 30% discount. Honestly, December 2nd was super late as a sale date. I remember buying the Hungarian Grand Prix tickets several months in advance, but just as an FYI, don’t be scared when searching for tickets.
I bought the tickets directly from the website dedicated to the Grand Prix and as you could expect there are many options you could choose from. The most important ones would be:
- Main Grandstand (two sectors – A, B). These are right in front of the pit stops, with visibility over the long fast line in the circuit. You would have the advantage of seeing the pit stops, but super fast action on the race as the pilots are flying with more than 300km/h on that side of the track
- Central Grandstand (four sectors – A, B, C, D). These are cheaper than Main Grandstand ones and are positioned in the few corners the circuit has
- General Access. These ones don’t give you access to a seat, but rather you can walk around the circuit area and see the race behind the walls over the circuit
- Paddock & VIP tickets
As a general expectation, every sector has big screens in front of the seats to see the evolution of the race and different things happening on the track. Everything passes by you super fast, so don’t expect to see a lot of action in real life compared to the comfortable seat at home. I would suggest consulting the race map before buying the tickets.
My friends and I chose Central Grandstand B, and the view was quite decent, with perfect visibility over one of the corners on the track. We made some friends there that stayed in Central Grandstand A, and personally, I think their view was better. All the tickets in the same category had the same price, and for the Central Grandstand, we paid 700SAR (~170€). But remember, the tickets had an initial 30% discount in the first days. I’m personally not disappointed with what we got, but I would probably go for Central Grandstand A next time.
Flight, visa and accommodation
The Wizzair flight from Bucharest to Jeddah was introduced a few months before the race ticket sale. Because the price was really good, we decided to buy the flight in advance and pay for a free cancel option, just in case the race tickets would be too expensive or sold out. In total, we paid less than 100€ for the flight and we selected the Monday-to-Monday journey to capture the full race weekend and spend a few more days in Saudi Arabia. In Jeddah, you can’t really fill a full week itinerary, so we spent the rest of our trip in AlUla. I detailed more about that and how we obtained the Saudi Arabia visa in this article.
Regarding accommodation, Jeddah is a big city with lots of options to choose from. We chose a hotel called Quiet Dreams – Quraysh Branch for which we paid ~80€/person for four nights in total. It wasn’t something fancy, but since we used the room only for sleeping and showering, and we were most of the day far away from it, it perfectly did the job. It’s not close to the circuit; it’s actually 15-17km away from it, but Uber was so cheap in Jeddah that this wasn’t an issue at all. From airport to the hotel and the other way around we used Uber as well, each ride being less than 10€
Most of the times I book my accommodation through booking.com, you can find different Jeddah options here.
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The race weekend
Now for the most important and best part – the race weekend! Oh my God, it was honestly amazing.
One thing that surprised me a lot about the race in Saudi Arabia was that, besides the track itself, everything was like a festival. Everyday, the gates would open at 13:00. FP1 and FP3 started at 16:00, while FP2, the qualifying session, and the race started at 20:00. Of course, there were also Formula 2 and other race events, but starting at 13:00 gave you plenty of time to explore the area and do different activities. Every day you would have to go by the security check and get a new bracelet, even though you purchased a weekend ticket: new day, new bracelet basically.
What do I mean by “festival”? Well, outside the track and the grandstand, you had access to:
- super cool things like F1 simulators, a pit stop challenge, carnival games, a karting track, ziplines, and many more activities you could do for FREE.
- after the racing events on Saturday and Sunday, there were different concerts organized in a dedicated area, with different local artists, but also big names like Charlie Puth or Swedish House Mafia. Entry for these events was included as well.
Now, if I think about it, I basically paid 170€ for 3-day access to the race, a lot of cool events, and a mini Tomorrowland. I would say that’s quite a deal!
Food had a decent price for such an event as well: 35SAR for a burger (~8.5€), 12SAR for a coffee (~3€), and 50SAR (~12€) for a pizza. A super cool thing was that one of the sponsors was a water company, and there were many booths around the area where you could get water for FREE. That was just amazing!
For coming and leaving the event, we only used Uber or Careem (a local Uber equivalent), depending on which one had a better price. It was quite fast and easy to find one, even during the night when everything was super busy with basically everyone leaving the area. We paid 60-70SAR (~15€) for a 6-person Uber to our hotel.
At the end of the event, the race track was open for everyone, using the gates near the Main Grandstand A. Basically everyone was allowed to walk on the track and if you were fast enough, you could arrive in time to see the awarding ceremony super close, quite a feeling I would say!
In one word: AMAZING. That’s how cool the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix was – perfect organization, amazing atmosphere, and a nice race!
Jeddah - outside the race track
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This article does not contain any paid promotion on hotels / rental car companies / restaurants etc., everything is documented based on my experience.
