(WHTM) NASCAR’s experiment with street courses may be over, at least temporarily.
For the last three seasons, stock cars took to the streets of Chicago beginning in 2023. It will not return in 2026, NASCAR announced Friday.
“Following the success of the first three years, the Chicago Street Race will hit pause in 2026 to afford us the time necessary to work collaboratively with the City of Chicago to explore a new potential date and to develop a plan that further optimizes operational efficiencies, with a goal to return to the streets of Chicago in 2027,” Julie Giese, president of the Chicago Street Race for NASCAR, said in a statement.
The event included a temporary course laid out in the city’s Grant Park section, the first street course in NASCAR Cup Series history and one of the first since NASCAR races at the Linden Airport in New Jersey in the 1950s. The street course was one of NASCAR’s recent initiatives to shake up the schedule, which included the addition of a temporary course inside the Los Angeles Coliseum.
The race marked NASCAR’s return to Chicagoland after racing ended at the Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Illinois, in 2019. It replaced an event at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, which hosted the Cup Series for two years.
Shane Van Gisbergen, of Australian V8 Supercars fame, won two of the three Chicago street course races, along with Alex Bowman.
