The Chicago Street Race weekend is NASCAR’s latest “swing-for-the-fences” moment.
It will be the first time the stock car racing series will race on a street circuit.
The NASCAR Cup Series and NASCAR Xfinity Series race cars will compete on a 12-turn, 2.2-mile street circuit, racing past and through many of Chicago’s most renowned downtown landmarks.
The Xfinity Series will compete in The Loop 121 on July 1 and the NASCAR Cup Series will be the main attraction in the Grant Park 220 the following day.
“As the home of the nation’s first automobile race in 1895, the inaugural Chicago Street Race will recognize the city of Chicago with the Grant Park 220 and The Loop 121,” said Julie Giese, Chicago Street Race president.
While racing NASCAR Cup Series stock cars through the streets of a world-class city is a monumental moment for the sanctioning body, it continues a pattern of bold gambles by the France family, including Ben Kennedy.
The 31-year-old Kennedy is the great grandson of NASCAR founder Bill France and serves as NASCAR’s senior vice president of racing development and strategy. Kennedy also came up with the idea of running the Busch Light Clash in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.
Racing through the streets of Chicago was Kennedy’s dream.
Throughout its 75-year history, NASCAR has not been afraid to dream big and take big swings.
It was NASCAR founder Bill France who envisioned a stock car series that would one day be as big as “Indianapolis cars.” He believed a racing series featuring the same cars people drive on the streets would better connect with an audience than purpose-built racing machines.
The same France took a big swing when he built a high-banked, 2.5-mile superspeedway — Daytona Int’l Speedway — just a few miles west of the Atlantic Ocean. The track hosted the first Daytona 500 in 1959.
Ten years later, the same France wanted to create a superspeedway on steroids near the Anniston Air Force Base in Talladega, Ala. France’s creation was wider, with more banking and longer at 2.66 miles.
Billed as the world’s fastest superspeedway, Talladega Superspeedway opened as Alabama Int’l Motor Speedway in 1969.
In a race that was boycotted by many of the top drivers who believed the new circuit was too fast for the tires, Richard Brickhouse earned his only NASCAR victory in the first race at Talladega.
There were other big swings ahead for NASCAR, some made by France’s son Bill France Jr., who helped bring R.J. Reynolds into NASCAR as the series sponsor, creating an era of rapid growth thanks to tobacco money and the Winston brand.
In 1992, France struck a deal with Indianapolis Motor Speedway President Tony George to have a NASCAR test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway
Two years later, the entire field of NASCAR Cup Series stars took the green flag for the inaugural Brickyard 400, perhaps the biggest day in NASCAR history on Aug, 6, 1994.
A California kid who moved to Pittsboro, Ind., so he could race as a teenager won that day. It was Jeff Gordon, who became one of the greatest drivers in NASCAR Cup Series history.
There were more big swings that followed for NASCAR, from new television deals that put the series on the same level as stick-and-ball sports, to a playoff system that virtually guarantees a “Game Seven” moment in the final race of the championship every season.
But racing stock cars on the streets of one of the world’s busiest cities may be the biggest gamble in NASCAR history.
The Next Gen car that is used in the Cup Series may be the most versatile car in series history. It can race competitively on high-banked superspeedways, 1.5-mile cookie-cutter ovals, short tracks and even natural terrain road courses.
But is it nimble enough to handle the tight quarters of a street course?