NASCAR to drive through Chicago in 2023 with first-ever street race

CHICAGO — NASCAR will celebrate its 75th season with an unprecedented street race through downtown Chicago in yet another radical change to the once staid schedule.

The Cup Series will race against the backdrop of Lake Michigan and Grant Park next July 2 in the debut race of a three-year deal with the city of Chicago. The venture was spearheaded by Ben Kennedy, the 30-year-old great-grandson of NASCAR founder Bill France.

It was Kennedy who successfully orchestrated the January exhibition race inside the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that will return for a second running in 2023. Kennedy told The Associated Press he began working on both the Coliseum and Chicago street race in 2019.

The new venues come as NASCAR has made sweeping changes to its oval-heavy schedule, first by adding both a dirt race at Bristol Motor Speedway and additional road courses and now a completely new concept.

The Chicago race will be paired with an IMSA sports car race the day before, as well as music and entertainment options located along the 12-turn, 2.2-mile street course.

«Historically we've always been short tracks, intermediates, superspeedways, eventually started getting more road courses and then came up with the Coliseum concept,» Kennedy told the AP.

«But the street course is something we haven't explored a whole lot before, and the the ability for us to get a downtown setting like his and bring racing to our fans, a street course is a perfect opportunity for it.»

NASCAR last month confirmed the Coliseum would return next January, but the rest of the 2023 schedule has yet to be announced. Kennedy, however, confirmed to the AP that the Chicago street course will replace the road course race at Road America on the Cup schedule.

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