F1 is filling rooms way outside Austin

MARBLE FALLS, Texas (KXAN) - As Austin's Formula One race approaches, rooms are getting tougher to find anywhere near the track -- for that matter, anywhere far from the track, too. Hotel rooms and Bed & Breakfast inns are sold out as far as Marble Falls for race weekend.

"No one expected that to move out this far," said Peggy Franklin, general manager at the Hampton Inn on the lake in Marble Falls. "We’re 60 miles from Austin so we were all a little caught off guard.”

Bill Rives of the Marble Falls Chamber of Commerce says an annual wine festival and holiday lights event will also be going during race weekend.

"That really is going to be an exciting time of year," Rives said. "It's going to kick off the whole holiday season."

Hotel managers say the F1 race out of Austin is the first time any major event has ever brought any overnight business out here to Marble Falls. It's never happened with ACL, it's never happened with South By Southwest or any other major event in the past.

Even small B&Bs are getting into the action. The Wallace Guest house has been sold out for weeks.

"We're having to turn people away," said Mark Stevens of the Wallace House B&B in Downtown Marble Falls. "We've got people coming from England for the full race week; it's busy it's been a good thing for us."

Restaurants and shops are also expecting to cash in as business owners hope this will be the start of more spillover business from future Austin big events.