IndyCar, Penske Entertainment And Hy-Vee Will Bring A Street Racing Festival To Short Oval Racing In Iowa

BY BRUCE MARTIN

Forbes SportsMoney

Iowa Speedway and Iowa-based supermarket chain Hy-Vee hope to bring IndyCar’s successful “street race” model to the Iowa short oval based just outside of Newton, Iowa.

In addition to two races that feature the fast-paced action of the NTT IndyCar Series cars and drivers, some of the biggest musical acts in entertainment will perform two pre-race 50-minute concerts and two 90-minute post-race concerts on the only doubleheader weekend on the 2022 IndyCar schedule.

On Saturday, July 23, three-time Grammy award winning country music star Tim McGraw will host a pre-race concert, while the Billboard record-holding country music duo, Florida Georgia Line, will perform later that afternoon following the first NTT IndyCar race of the weekend.

On Sunday, July 24th, three-time Grammy award winner, Gwen Stefani will be onstage. To close the weekend nine-time Grammy nominated country music star Blake Shelton will host a concert following the second IndyCar race of the weekend.

In addition to the big-name entertainment acts from the music industry, a Food Truck Village with more than 70 vendors will be set up just outside of the grandstands, giving this short oval weekend of racing a true street festival feel.

It’s a combination that has proven highly successful at the street events on the IndyCar schedule including St. Petersburg, Florida; Long Beach, California; Detroit, Toronto and Nashville, Tennessee.

Two weeks ago, the NTT IndyCar Series began its season at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg in front of the largest crowd in the history of the event. IndyCar and race promoter Green Savoree Promotions estimate over 150,000 spectators attended the street race over the three-day weekend.

On April 9, the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach will continue a Southern California tradition that began in 1975. IndyCar and Grand Prix Association of Long Beach race organizers expect 185,000 fans to attend the street festival over three days, making it one of the largest sporting events in California.

Although the headliners of both events are the cars and stars of the NTT IndyCar Series, these two street races feature a street festival atmosphere that includes live music, food trucks, car shows and other events that gives both the hard core and the non-fan something appealing.

The two events also transform the city streets into a street party featuring speed, food, entertainment, and nightlife, infusing the local economy with additional monetary benefit.

Many of the fans that come to St. Petersburg, Florida and Long Beach, California are there for the party. Some are even interested in the racing. But it’s a recipe that has proven successful at Long Beach since 1975 and St. Petersburg since 2003.

While some street races have thrived, attendance at some of the oval tracks on the NTT IndyCar Series schedule have dwindled. On February 20, Texas Motor Speedway will host the XPEL 375 at the 1.5-mile high-banked oval. Back in 1997, the first IndyCar Series race at TMS drew 129,000 fans.

In recent years, however, there may not have been less than 20,000 fans in attendance at Texas and even fewer at other oval tracks.

The typical schedule at many of the ovals was practice, qualifications, and the race, leaving large blocks of time of inactivity or entertainment for the spectators.

Despite its popularity among racers and avid fans, the .875-mile Iowa Speedway sat dormant in 2021. IndyCar had competed successfully on that short track since 2007, but when NASCAR took over the facility in 2017, promotion for the IndyCar event was reduced.

In 2020, Roger Penske and Penske Entertainment leased the track from NASCAR to stage a Friday night/Saturday night doubleheader in the midst of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Because of health concerns, attendance was limited to 7,500 spectators and the two races proved successful.

Without a promoter for 2021, however, Iowa Speedway was left off the schedule.

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds acted. She contacted Newton, Iowa Mayor Michael

Hansen and the two began an effort to save Iowa Speedway.

The key was contacting West Des Moines, Iowa-based Hy-Vee Supermarket CEO Randall Edeker. He quickly agreed to become a major partner of the revitalization of Iowa Speedway. Penske Entertainment – which owns and operates IndyCar, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and the Indianapolis 500 – would be the promoter.

The new entity has leased the dormant facility from NASCAR and has full control of the property for as long as the event remains feasible.

The partnership between Hy-Vee, IndyCar and Penske Entertainment has given Iowa Speedway a chance to flourish on the schedule.

“I’ve known Randy now for about a year, and what I’ve discovered from Randy and the Hy-Vee team is when they do something, they do it big, they do it right, they do it massively successful,” Penske Corporation President Bud Denker said. “We are looking forward to putting on an event, not just a race for that entire weekend.

“To think about these four acts. Normally you would fill up a stadium or arena with one of these acts for one evening. We’re going to have four Class A entertainers at the Iowa Speedway pre-race, post-race 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.”

Iowa Speedway features one of the smallest grandstands of any permanent facility on the IndyCar schedule, but it does have the opportunity to add temporary seats and suites to accommodate larger crowds.

“We only have about 12,000 to 15,000 tickets to sell each day because ticket sales have been pretty good so far,” Denker continued. “I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen a lineup like this before. I’ve been in motorsports for a long time. To see what they have for that weekend in Iowa, you can’t get a hotel. Good luck anywhere around the area. Some people ahead of time must have known about this so already secured all the hotels, which is a good thing.

“It going to be a massive event. We’re very excited about it. It adds to the excitement for the IndyCar Series. To have a partner like Hy-Vee, I’ve never seen this before in my career to have this type of entertainment.”

Edeker’s interest in IndyCar began as a single-race sponsor on Graham Rahal’s No. 15 Honda for the second race of the 2020 doubleheader at Iowa Speedway. Many of Hy-Vee’s distributors and vendors were so excited at the promotional potential of an IndyCar partnership, they convinced Edeker to add even more races to the sponsorship.

That grew to a fully funded second-car at Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing featuring driver Jack Harvey of England. Hy-Vee has created a series of commercials featuring Harvey in the Midwest entitled “You Don’t Know, Jack.”

By becoming a co-promoter of Iowa Speedway, Hy-Vee has secured an even bigger role in IndyCar. The company has already announced plans to expand with supermarkets based in Indianapolis as well as Kentucky and Tennessee.

“I think the perfect fit is that the fits our strategy, it fits a digital strategy that we’re working on,” Edeker said. “You see that on the car with Hy-VeeDeals.com. That’s a strategy we’re working with a nationwide ship-to-home strategy.

“We see that working through frankly our partnership with NBC Sports, a giveaway we’re doing across every single week across the country.

“I see it in a partnership with Roger Penske and with Bud Denker, just looking at their strategy overall for IndyCar, the growth of IndyCar, how they want to grow the sport.”

For Edeker and Hy-Vee, a national pandemic created the opportunity to expand and grow its business to another sport that seems to have thrived despite the challenging times the world has encountered.

“We look at it like this: we feel like we’ve joined IndyCar at the right time,” Edeker said. “IndyCar has a long history. I’ve looked at the long history. I feel like we’re on the cusp of something much bigger. I think the sport is going to take off. We’re investing in that possibility. We believe that we wanted to be a part of it. That’s why we made the investment.

“The race is hugely important to us. The event for us is to really have a signature event here in our state, help our state. We are in eight other states. We’re going to be in a total of 13 states over the next several years as we expand.

“But Iowa is super important to us. We wanted to invest in the track. That’s why we went all in. We think we’re on the cusp of Indy really starting to grow with some of the strategies they have, and we wanted to invest in it now and be on the cutting edge of that moving forward.”

Together, they hope to turn the Iowa doubleheader weekend into a big event for the state of Iowa by bringing the street race model concept to the short track.

“I go back to the word ‘event’ versus ‘races’ that we have in this series,” Denker said. “Urban markets we know are so important for us. When you think about what we’re going to do at the Iowa Speedway right now with two races, this secular motion of entertainment involved. I think about the number of fans we’re going to have at this event who have never been to a race before because they’re coming for a different reason, to see entertainment.

“By the way, there’s a world class event going on.”