NASCAR has committed three dates a year right now to unorthodox markets and concepts
For the first time since 1958, the NASCAR Cup Series will contest a points paying event outside of the United States when it races alongside the Xfinity Series at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City on June 14-15.
This was the culmination of at least two years of work where officials from the sanctioning body put real effort towards taking the Cup Series to either Mexico or Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
At the same time, NASCAR is in the third year of a three-year deal with the City of Chicago to race in downtown on the streets near Grant Park. Both events serve a similar purpose of growing the sport beyond its traditional markets and borders so the obvious question is what's next?
In a conversation with the Sports Business Journal, NASCAR COO Steve O'Donnell said there are 'a number of folks who are interested at looking at NASCAR from a street race (perspective).'
It's important to NASCAR that they return to Southern California after spending three years racing at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum with the Busch Clash, an event that is being taken to the venerably historic Bowman Gray Stadium in 2025.
Auto Club Speedway has also been partially demolished with no real progress being started on transforming the former two-mile superspeedway into a half-mile short track, which has been NASCAR's stated goal with the property.
"We are certainly interested in California and the Southern California market," said O'Donnell to the SBJ, "and that will continue to be a focus for us, but nothing to confirm at this point."
Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund has been linked to every sports and entertainment property in the west and NASCAR is no exception.
O'Donnell addressed that as well.
"I wouldn't put it specifically on Saudi," said the COO, while also citing interest from entities in Asia and Europe.
"We've got a finite amount of content we can bring but I think as you look at NASCAR from an international standpoint, it'll be more around that Mexico model where we want to look to grow the overall sport and build it within the culture wherever we go. So we can certainly take a race from an exhibition standpoint or from a national series but you'll see it coupled if we do go somewhere with a grassroots efforts as well."
Grassroots, meaning historic style short tracks like Bowman Gray, North Wilkesboro and Rockingam, the latter of which will rejoin the Xfinity Series and Truck Series schedules on Easter Weekend next year.
Full circle, what does that mean for Chicago, which NASCAR has spent around $40-50 million dollars as an investment into the sport but has also had no shortage of pushback from local politicians and lobbyists within the Windy City.
The perception is that 2025 will be the last of this event's run, just as it was in Los Angeles.
"For us, we're just looking at 2025. It'll be the third year of a three-year run and each year we've wanted to build upon the momentum that we have," O'Donnell said. "We've learned things each and every year -- it's our first street race, a lot of learnings came from that. A lot of weather challenges as well. ... We've made some tweaks to the event format and continuing to evolve that as well, so we'll get through the event, see where things are, but concentrating on 2025 and making that event as successful as it can be."