Grassroots motorsport is measured through more than headline race results. Clubs, licence holders, competition starts, volunteers, karting drivers, and regional programmes all show how people enter and sustain the sport. The available figures below cover the UK, the United States, and FIA programmes, with dates and geographies kept explicit.
Contents
- UK clubs, licences, and affordable entry
- The UK competition network
- U.S. club membership and autocross
- Karting as an international entry point
- Regional grassroots pathways
- Participation, inclusion, and the FIA Motorsport Games
UK clubs, licences, and affordable entry
Motorsport UK reported 676 motor clubs in 2023. Those clubs hosted 3,930 events across the country during the same year, while the UK had 70,000 competition licence holders. Together, those figures describe a participation base spread across local organisations and a large number of organised opportunities.
The route into competition can also be relatively small in scale. Motorsport UK described a StreetCar event as costing about £30 in entry fees, before fuel and other expenses. The programme covered four disciplines: autotest, car trials, cross-country, and road rallying. That combination gives prospective competitors several formats to try without treating circuit racing as the only definition of grassroots participation.
The figures come from Motorsport UK’s Motorsport in the UK: more affordable and accessible than ever before, which describes 2023 club and licence figures and the programme details in its 2024 discussion. The cost is therefore a reported example, not a universal price for every event or competitor.
The UK competition network
Motorsport UK’s Vision 2030 strategy snapshot reported 64,000 licensed competitors in 2025, compared with 32,000 more than in 2018. The same snapshot described more than 600 affiliated clubs, more than 3,500 permitted events each year, and 122,000 competition starts spanning the UK.
Participation depends on the people who organise and operate those events. The strategy counted 11,000 trained and accredited volunteers and officials, supported by more than 25,000 online training modules. Volunteers contributed more than 500,000 hours to British motorsport each year. These are activity measures rather than counts of unique fans or spectators, but they show the operational scale required to turn club interest into competition.
The UK infrastructure also included more than 1,000 motorsport venues and 14 disciplines in the grassroots-to-grandstand ecosystem. The numbers are not directly interchangeable: the 2023 report gives 70,000 competition licence holders, while the 2025 strategy snapshot reports 64,000 licensed competitors. Each figure should be read within its own source and measurement context rather than combined as a single time series.
Source: MotorSport UK Vision 2030.
| UK participation measure | Reported figure | Period or basis |
|---|---|---|
| Motor clubs | 676 | 2023 |
| Club-hosted events | 3,930 | 2023 |
| Competition licence holders | 70,000 | 2023 |
| Licensed competitors | 64,000 | 2025 snapshot |
| Competition starts | 122,000 | 2025 snapshot |
| Venues | More than 1,000 | 2025 snapshot |
U.S. club membership and autocross
The Sports Car Club of America reported annual membership above 51,000 in May 2023. It also said members purchased roughly 20,000 weekend memberships each year. Including those weekend memberships, SCCA said total membership topped 70,000 in 2023. The organisation’s U.S. club structure comprised 115 regions.
SCCA’s figures also show how participation can develop through different event types. About 8% of new members had participated in Track Night before joining, according to the 2023 report. That is a pathway statistic: it identifies one recorded connection between a lower-commitment track experience and later club membership, rather than claiming that every new member followed the same route.
Autocross activity rose in the comparison supplied by SCCA. Tire Rack SCCA ProSolo Series entries averaged a 21% per-event increase in 2022 versus 2021. The number of SCCA regional autocross events rose 27% year over year in 2022, while annual SCCA autocross entry counts increased 22% over the same comparison.
| SCCA measure | Reported figure | Comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Annual membership | More than 51,000 | May 2023 |
| Weekend memberships | Roughly 20,000 | Annual estimate reported in 2023 |
| Total membership including weekend memberships | More than 70,000 | 2023 |
| U.S. regions | 115 | 2023 |
| ProSolo entries per event | 21% increase | 2022 vs. 2021 |
| Regional autocross events | 27% increase | 2022 vs. 2021 |
| Annual autocross entries | 22% increase | 2022 vs. 2021 |
Source: SCCA Annual Membership: 50,000 and Counting.
Karting as an international entry point
FIA Karting Championships recorded 927 entries across eight events in 2024. Those entries came from 629 different drivers representing six FIA Sport Regions. The FIA International Karting Ranking listed 1,123 drivers in 2024, while the National Karting Ranking listed 1,120 drivers. The national ranking grew 221% compared with 2023; the first international ranking had produced a 2023 ranking of 1,142 drivers.
The 2024 FIA Karting Academy Trophy had 51 drivers from 50 nations. Karting also contributed 225 drivers to the 2024 FIA Motorsport Games, where karting drivers made up more than 30% of the 646 participants. These measures describe different competitions and should not be added together: championship entries, ranked drivers, academy drivers, and Motorsport Games participants are separate reporting populations.
An announced 2025 FIA Karting Arrive and Drive World Cup illustrates the demand for an accessible format. Its planned grid included 108 drivers from 46 countries, including 48 drivers from Asia and 14 female drivers across the Junior and Senior categories. The affordable World Cup’s 90 grid spots filled within hours after applications opened in 2025. These are event-announcement and application figures for 2025, not a forecast of overall karting participation.
Source: Circuit – FIA Activity Report 2024 and Grassroots Motor Sport Participation Widens with FIA’s Global Karting Plan.
Regional grassroots pathways
The FIA European Sport Region contained 50 Clubs in 2024, while 20 FIA Clubs in North America were involved in regional sport activity. Across other regions, the Central American Karting Championship’s two 2024 events attracted 80 young drivers. The South American Karting Championship featured 64 drivers from seven countries, and the first Africa Karting Cup drew 61 competitors from nine African countries.
The MENA Karting Nations Cup welcomed more than 150 drivers from 16 countries in 2024. The Asia Pacific Karting Championship attracted 66 competitors. These event totals provide snapshots of regional activity; they are not a global participant total and may represent different competition formats.
Esports appeared alongside physical karting. The North American Esport Championship involved 40 drivers in 2024. The FIA Asia Pacific working group estimated female participation at 5–7% in 2024, while Asia Pacific programmes reported a 37% increase in female participation and a 25% increase in officials during that year.
The region also reported planned development activity for 2025. The re-established Asia Auto-Gymkhana Championship planned a four-round series targeting participation from 16 ASNs. The FIA Asia Pacific Karting Slalom Group planned activities across eight countries, and the planned 2025 Asia Pacific Motorsport Championship in Sri Lanka was set to feature six disciplines. Planned events are distinct from completed participation counts.
Source: Regional Successes – FIA Activity Report 2024.
Participation, inclusion, and the FIA Motorsport Games
The 2024 FIA Motorsport Games expanded to 26 categories from 16 in 2022. The 2024 edition represented 82 countries, with 17 countries participating for the first time. A total of 646 drivers competed, including a record 106 female competitors.
The event’s breadth included both digital and junior categories. Its Esports competition had 117 drivers in 2024. The Nordic Esports Championship final brought 25 on-site drivers to Stockholm in April 2024, while the MENA Esports Cup final brought 24 drivers from 12 countries to Amman.
Karting accounted for 225 drivers at the Games, more than 30% of all 646 participants. The 2024 programme also included Karting Sprint Mini and Cross Car Mini categories for children as young as eight. That age detail identifies an available competition category, not a claim that all grassroots competitors begin at that age.
Taken together, the FIA figures show several dimensions of participation: country reach, new national representation, female competitors, esports, karting, and junior categories. They also reinforce why a single participation number can be misleading. A club member, a ranked karting driver, a volunteer, an event entry, and a competition start each describe a different relationship with motorsport.
Source: Circuit – FIA Activity Report 2024.