IndyCar Rumor: Stick a fork in the Iowa race, it will soon be done

Stick a fork in the Iowa IndyCar race(s), if it’s not done next year, it soon will be done – another failed IndyCar oval race.

Penske Corp. president Bud Denker said July 10th that IndyCar plans to race at Iowa Speedway by holding one race in 2026, but that a return is not guaranteed.

The empty grandstands at Iowa Speedway tell a story IndyCar doesn’t want to hear. While the NASCAR stock car series celebrates back-to-back sellouts at the track, IndyCar is staring at a potential disaster that could end its relationship with one of its former crown jewel venues. 

Why Is IndyCar Struggling at Iowa While NASCAR Thrives?

When Hy-Vee sponsored the IndyCar races at Iowa, they brought in big-name concerts, and the grandstands were full.  Hy-Vee is now gone, and so too are the big-name concerts. That’s the reason why the grandstands are nearly empty for the 2025 event – the fans were there for the concerts, not the races.

The numbers paint a grim picture for the open-wheel series. It’s a double-header weekend, but according to IndyCar reporter Nathan Brown, fewer than 6,000 tickets have been sold for each event day, but fewer than 2,000 showed up on race day Saturday. This represents only a fraction of a venue that has a seating capacity of about 30,000 people.

Meanwhile, Iowa has racing enthusiasts. Look at the Cup Series races: Their debut race, Iowa Corn 350 Powered by Ethanol in 2024, was a sellout, and even the 2025 one, scheduled to kick off in August, is already sold out. So clearly, there is a racing market, but IndyCar fans have rejected another oval event and rumor has it this may be the last year IndyCar race in Iowa.

“You feel this intensity that truly it’s a make-or-break year,” said IndyCar driver Graham Rahal, who was sponsored in part by West Des Moines-based Hy-Vee from 2022-24.

“If it doesn’t go well, I don’t see us coming back here. If you don’t have a whole lot of people and it doesn’t go well, you’re dead. But if you don’t have a whole lot people and it’s a great race, then there’s hope because people will come back.”