2024-08-26 02:50:02
WEST ALLIS – After a two-year run for NASCAR’s return in its latest go-round at the Milwaukee Mile, the Craftsman Truck Series won’t be back in 2025, the State Fair Park board chairman said Sunday.
IndyCar will race on Aug. 24 – the date that corresponds to NASCAR races at the track in 2023 and ’24 – a week earlier than it will this season, due to television commitments, chairman John Yingling said.
Track Enterprises, which has promoted the track’s stock car races since 2019, was unable to secure another date with NASCAR that didn’t also conflict with the time blocked out for State Fair and its setup and cleanup or other events at the grounds.
“It’s a matter of scheduling and matter of Indy changing from one television network to another television network,” Yingling said before the LiUNA! 175. “Obviously, Fox is a major NFL network, and obviously the NFL does not start on Labor Day. They start the weekend after, and Fox will have a noon game. They will have a 3:25 game.
“That just changed television dynamics. And as you know, television dynamics kind of rule the world, whether it be with network television now or streaming services, right?”
IndyCar is moving from NBC to Fox. NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races appear on FS1.
Track Enterprises’ Bob Sargent, who began promoting races at the Mile with a Midwest Tour stock cars in 2019, has said he had a multiyear agreement with NASCAR for Milwaukee with the expectation of date equity. The return of the Truck Series last year marked the first NASCAR race at the track since 2009.
“I mean, they can do whatever they want,” Sargent said. “They own the facility.
“We had our date. I can’t say it any more clearly. Basically, they just bumped us.”
A year ago, IndyCar announced its intention to return to the Mile after eight years away with a Labor Day weekend doubleheader. That put four races – those two, the NASCAR trucks and companion ARCA Menards Series events – in an eight-day span.
Then IndyCar Series announced its 2025 schedule in June, with a single race at Milwaukee on Aug. 24. State Fair Park itself is promoting the IndyCar races with assistance from the sanctioning body.
More than $8 million has been spent or committed for future expenditure to get the facility to IndyCar’s standards, Yingling said.
Since the 2025 IndyCar schedule was announced, Sargent has deferred questions about the return of the truck series until a final decision was made. As time passed, though, his response seemed to indicate growing concern about finding another date.
A NASCAR schedule announcement is expected as soon as this week.
This will mark the third straight year in which a NASCAR national series race in Wisconsin wasn’t renewed, following the premier Cup Series after its 2021-22 run at Road America in Elkhart Lake and the Xfinity Series’ 14-year run from 2010 through 2023 there.
“I think NASCAR would miss a huge opportunity to not have a (race in Wisconsin), and whether it’s the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series here at the Mile, or Xfinity at Road America, or any series in Wisconsin, I think … there’s a hunger for it here,” said LiUNA! 175 polesitter Ty Majeski, a Seymour native.
“We’ve seen massive crowds at Road America. The crowd last year was great. So I think it’s huge missed opportunity if NASCAR doesn’t come to Wisconsin at some point or another next year. So, yeah, I’m hearing rumors that it may be the last one for the time being.”
Sargent said he worked on at least 10 dates other than the weekend before Labor Day, but either NASCAR or the Fair had a conflict that precluded each of them.
Although Sargent was noncommittal about the future, Yingling expressed optimism NASCAR could return to the Mile in 2026.
“I think we continue to have great relationships with Track Enterprises and Bob Sargent,” Yingling said. “Bob Sargent’s our guy when it comes to NASCAR and building NASCAR here, but it’s also more because Bob has more depth than just NASCAR. He’s really good the entire late model stocks all the way up.
“Bob and I have had many conversations about getting other races, moving to Xfinity, seeing what we could do with Cup.”
