NASCAR keeping options open for future championship race venues

It remains to be seen which tracks will be included in the rotation to host NASCAR championship weekend, but numerous variables will be taken into account.

“As you think about a championship race, ideally, (you want) a warm weather kind of climate location,” Ben Kennedy, NASCAR executive vice president and chief venue and racing innovation officer, said. “You can’t race everywhere in the world, especially in early November, so there’s a handful of venues and properties that we tend to gravitate towards.

“We want to make sure it’s marketed and promoted the right way. Phoenix is a great example of this. You saw the $100 million project we put into the reimagine of Phoenix Raceway. Homestead isn’t a Phoenix Raceway, and it probably won’t be to that level when we come for the championship next year, but we are going to be putting some capital in that facility to make sure it is a championship-caliber property when we show up to it next year.

“Then overall, the racing product. I think this is another part of the discussion that we’ve had.”

NASCAR announced on Tuesday that Homestead-Miami Speedway will host its championship weekend in November 2026, the 1.5-mile oval returning to the season finale slot for the first time in seven years. It hosted the final race of the season from 2002 through 2019. Phoenix Raceway was handed the baton in 2020, and will host the finale for the sixth consecutive year in November.

Phoenix will remain in the rotation alongside Homestead-Miami. NASCAR owns both racetracks.

Speedway Motorsports owns or operates other venues that some would look to see included. Kennedy admitted that whether it’s a NASCAR property or elsewhere, the sanctioning body is open to all options.

“The great part about it,” Kennedy said, “is we have a good relationship with Speedway Motorsports, and they have many prominent events in the playoffs (with) cutoff races at the Charlotte Roval and Bristol and a handful of others. Nothing to report today on exactly where we would be considering or where those properties might be, but I think all cards are on the table at this point.”

NASCAR does have some non-starters for venue hosts.

“Never say never, but I think we’ve unanimously agreed that it needs to look and feel like what we would expect traditional NASCAR racing to look and feel like,” Kennedy said. “Short tracks, intermediate tracks, mile tracks are all on the board. Superspeedways, I think we all feel like right now we wouldn’t consider that as a championship venue – not that Daytona isn’t a championship-caliber venue.

“There are a lot of storylines that come out of those events, and we want to make sure that, when we go to Homestead, Miami, or Phoenix or wherever it might be in the future, that there is a lot of strategy and that a lot of our championship drivers are also contending for the victory at the end of that race. We talked about that. We’ve talked about road courses as well. Again, never say never, but road courses are probably lower on the list as we think about championship venues. So, we’re really going to hone in on short tracks and mile-and-a-halves for now.”