Popular sports venues "soft targets" for protests, says Silverstone boss

Six members of the environmental activist group broke onto the circuit during the opening lap of last year’s F1 race but a red flag owing to the crash for Alfa Romeo driver Zhou Guanyu meant the cars had slowed significantly when they passed the demonstrators on-track on the Wellington Straight.

Three of the protestors were given suspended prison sentences and the others handed community orders and unpaid work.

The Grand National at former F1 venue Aintree was delayed earlier this month by protestors said to be from the animal rights group Animal Rising, while Just Stop Oil interrupted the World Snooker Championships in Sheffield this week by climbing onto the table and dropping orange powder.

This has led to concerns that the London Marathon and The Open golf event later in the year might also be hit.

Silverstone managing director Stuart Pringle said events such as the 1987 track invasion to greet victor Nigel Mansell meant the venue was already advanced with its preventative measures.

Reflecting on the interruption in 2022, Pringle told Autosport: “Obviously there are lessons to be learned. Both our fencing and crowd stewards are significantly different to Australia [which was summoned by the FIA for a track invasion earlier this season]. We have been way more advanced.

“Frankly, since '87 and people hopping over the fence to embrace Nige, we've been pretty on that.

“We've done a massive internal review post-last year. We're working closely with the police again.”

Fans

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

While Pringle stressed circuit organisers were working to “make sure people’s fun is not spoilt again”, he did concede that the popularity of F1 made the British GP an inevitable target.

Calling sports event a “softish targets” for protestors, he continued: “I don't in any way take this risk lightly. I'd be surprised if there wasn't some degree of correlation between the protest at Silverstone and people who think it would be a good idea to go and have a crack at Aintree [Grand National] and get their own message in there.

“We know that people have tried to cable tie themselves to goals in football games [Everton versus Newcastle Premier League fixture in March 2022].

“It's people knowing there's lots of eyeballs on sports. Where else can you do it?

“Sports venues as a whole are, relatively speaking, softish targets with quite a high reward for the risk that the individuals are taking on. It's just something we have to deal with as sports promoters.

“But we will work hard to make sure that people's fun is not spoilt again this year.

“They're only doing it because there's a hundred million people watching around the world.”