IndyCar using a major metro music strategy at Iowa Speedway, attracting fans with concerts

Nestled among the cornfields outside Newton (population 15,760), Iowa Speedway won’t be mistaken for an urban market, but IndyCar wants to imbue big-city vibes with an ambitious concerts strategy.

Announcing a lineup of Tim McGraw, Florida Georgia Line, Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton that will play before and after each race during the NTT IndyCar Series’ doubleheader weekend July 23-24 at Iowa Speedway, race and series officials are aiming to draw sellout crowds with a formula modeled on successful IndyCar races in major metropolitan markets.

Street races in St. Petersburg (which enjoyed record attendance last month), Long Beach and Nashville have drawn weekend crowds into the six figures by creating festival atmospheres that are predicated largely on nonstop cars and concerts to keep fans entertained.

“As we get to these markets like Iowa, you need to create that event,” Penske Corp. president Bud Denker said during a Zoom news conference Monday. “Without the attachment to an urban market, you have to have the event to draw you in. We want to take it and apply to other tracks we go to in the future.”

Denker said Iowa has about “12 to 15,000 tickets to sell each day.” The 0.875-mile track has 24,000 permanent seats (plus suites) but will add temporary grandstands in the turns. Denker said the goal is race-day crowds of 40,000.

“To think about these four acts, normally you’d fill up a stadium or arena with one of these acts for one evening,” he said. “We’re going to have four Class A entertainers prerace, postrace that entire weekend. It is going to be a massive weekend for us. I’m looking for huge ticket sales today as a result of this.

“We hope to sell it out very soon.”

Don’t miss the party coming to