Why the British motorsport industry is on the cusp of a new golden era

Chris Aylett is an engaging chap, an entertaining raconteur. He’s just turning 79 at the time you read this, yet his enthusiasm for the Motorsport Industry Association – which he helms as CEO – and the sport in general shows no sign of dimming.

His eyes light up as he reminisces about the Chevron B8 and McLaren M8 he used to race, and the Steigenberger Supersports Cup he audaciously set up for historic machinery. But that’s not what he’s here to discuss (these are stories for another time!). Instead, we are on the cusp, Aylett believes, of a golden era for the British motorsport industry.

“We’ve always had a very good heritage in the business of motorsport,” explains Aylett. “For a small island, we have tentacles all over the world. We’re much more international than most other places. One could say there’s hardly a major race meeting anywhere in the world that is run without something coming from the UK.

“The supply chain within Motorsport Valley [the well-known, MIA-trademarked name for the Milton Keynes-Silverstone-Banbury corridor, which, ironically, is not a valley] is complete; no other country has anything like it.”

Now, in the wake of Liberty’s takeover of Formula 1, Aylett reckons the sport as a whole will thrive on a “trickle-down” effect. According to a report conducted by Grant Thornton, the annual turnover for the motorsport and engineering sector in the UK has almost doubled from 2012 to 2023, to £16billion, with 50,000 people in employment.

“When Liberty got hold of it and decided to put their headquarters of their investment in England, suddenly we had an American influence with that knowledge of entertainment,” enthuses Aylett.

“And the exciting opportunity that we’re now focused on is maximising the audience. They’re going to change the financial dynamics and action dynamics of motorsport, and we’re right in pole position of being central to all that.

“We can be polarised with F1, but it’s going to be interesting to see how one at a time it spreads. Once they’ve learned the Liberty model, other series will follow.

Aylett details the bright future for the motorsport industry in the UK

“One of the things about motorsport is you need a rapid response – you do that by having proximity among the supply chain. It’s true of all industries. Here, if you want something fixed, you get a guy on a bicycle to ride around the corner and say, ‘Here’s your solution’. If you have an Italian, German or American solution, nowadays it could get held up forever with all the changes in paperwork.

“So this idea of a business hub, this community that we’ve created, the MIA brought the name to the fore and registered it: Motorsport Valley.”

As a diehard motorsport traditionalist, your columnist is a little unnerved by this. Yes, Liberty has been behind the explosion of interest in F1, with Drive to Survive and the F1 film playing a huge part. But what will be the cost to the purity of the sport of such a US entertainment-based influence?

You only have to look at football’s 2026 World Cup debacle. Or what about playoffs formats (long established in NASCAR, and which polluted Australia’s Supercars series in 2025), or the poisonous social media trolling experienced by F1 figures in recent years? Was it better to exist in our nice little niche of old?

“The F1 movie has caught the imagination of young people, and their parents. It’s winning over the hearts and minds of the families” Chris Aylett

But of course, Aylett is here to represent the MIA and his members. And there are very good knock-on effects resulting from the surge of interest in the sport.

“It’s also attracting girls and boys to come into this sector in droves,” he says. “I always remember the JFK thing: the moment he said, ‘Let’s go to the moon’, the kids all wanted to study space engineering. This is happening in exactly the same way: the F1 movie has caught the imagination of young people, and their parents. It’s winning over the hearts and minds of the families.”

Aylett chuckles: “Without naming names, in the early days [of the MIA] I said, ‘The thing that’s going to hold you all back is some of the names that we have running motorsport.’ Now, suddenly, the increase in female interest in working in motorsport in senior technology roles is fantastic.”

The MIA has come a long way from its formation in 1994, and since Aylett took his current role in 1998. “You need this unity, this gang, this family,” he says. “When I took this role on, it was divide and conquer. I did go to one or two influential people when I set up the MIA, and they didn’t think there was any future in it, which gave me all the encouragement I needed!” And that, you get the feeling, has given Aylett another fund of stories…

This article is one of many in the monthly Autosport magazine. For more premium content, take a look at the February 2026 issue and subscribe today. 

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