Silverstone is set to sell out its new four-day capacity of 570,000 in July, a crowd that would make Silverstone F1 the biggest event in the history of the championship. The figure would top the previous Formula One high of 520,000, set by the Australian GP in 1995.

That is why the British GP is being searched now: the race that once looked vulnerable is about to become the sport’s largest gathering. The British GP has been on the Formula One calendar since 1950, but the numbers now point to a very different scale, with a sell-out crowd expected across four days rather than the race-day audiences of 139,000 that Silverstone drew in 2015 and 2016.

Stuart Pringle, who was given an OBE this year for his work, said the turnaround would have seemed absurd not long ago. Female attendance now makes up 43% of sales at the British GP, and the Landostand has been expanded to hold 20,000 this year, with women making up more than half of that crowd. He said the mix of fans and the value of the weekend were now working for Silverstone, powered by the wider rise in Formula One’s popularity.

The boom sits on a past that was much harsher. Silverstone lost £2.8m in 2015 and £4.8m in 2016, and in 2017 it activated the break clause on its contract with Formula One because the old deal was seen as unsustainable. The fee had climbed from £11.5m in 2010 to £16.2m in 2017, and was due to reach £25m by 2026, a path that would have made the race far more expensive to keep.

Pringle said pulling the break clause was less frightening than staying trapped in the old arrangement. He said he signed the new deal with Liberty Media on the Wednesday afternoon before the British GP of 2019 began on Friday morning, and described the final stretch as nerve-racking. That last-minute agreement is what kept the race in place long enough for the crowd to grow into something the calendar has never seen before. The only question left is whether July merely fills Silverstone’s new capacity or marks the start of a level of demand the circuit can keep when the event moves on.