Pocono Raceway Finds Sweet Spot On Nascar Schedule With Dedication To The Environment

The long, quiet road leading up to Pocono Raceway is much different than a decade ago.

Down the street from one of the largest tracks on the Nascar schedule now lies a massive facility, Pocono Organics, which sponsored one of the Cup Series’ races at the Tricky Triangle in 2021. And just next to the regenerative organic certified farm is Pocono’s solar farm, which opened in 2010.

As a staple on the Nascar schedule, Pocono is one of the few tracks to fully embrace solar energy. So much so that it’s become a core part of the fan experience at the racetrack, which is 90 minutes from New York City.

“There’s a business part of this and do the right thing part of this,” Pocono Raceway President Ben May said prior to Sunday’s M&M’s Fan Appreciation 400. “Our top core value is integrity and it’s so important for us with our fan base and leadership. We want the Pocono Raceway to be sustainable and we want the Pocono mountains to be a beautiful place 100 years from now.”

Pocono Raceway is in the middle of its own transition, finding its new place on the Nascar schedule. For decades, the 2.5-mile Tricky Triangle had two races on the schedule. But two years ago, Nascar decided to take one of its weekends away and held a Saturday-Sunday double header, the first of its kind.

This year, Nascar left Pocono with one race weekend again, but only one Cup Series race for the first time since 1981. The result was positive, though.

Fans had plenty of time to see the solar farm and Pocono Organics headquarters on Sunday, with traffic backed up for miles heading into the track for the near-soldout crowd. The one race weekend proved to be successful as the infield sold out and so did the track’s executive suites, with firms like Mars, HighPoint and Worldwide Express.

For Pocono Raceway, one of the few independent racetracks in Nascar, its green program is helping it stay on the schedule.

“This is part of our ecosystem here,” May said. “In theory, we’re off the grid. The second part of it is a business decision. 10 to 12 years ago, when we went solar, power was being deregulated in Pennsylvania. This facility is massive and it had a giant power bill. We still don’t store the power here – we send it back to the grid.”

Moving forward, the folks at Pocono are inspired by the Philadelphia Eagles and their dedication to the environment.

“The Eagles have done a great job of this with their sustainability deal,” May said. “You don’t see it at racetracks for whatever reason, but you’re seeing it in a lot of professional sports. I think the Eagles are at 97% waste diversion, which is fantastic.

“We got to around 75% in 2019, ensuring that we are diverting most of the waste to a landfill. What we can’t control is our RV and camping lots. We also have a lot of land here. We have a couple of thousand acres and to take 25 acres across the street to focus on our brand with Pocono Green was a pretty easy decision.”

Track executives have found a unique way to solidify their future, even as Nascar continuously changes the schedule and is searching for ways to find new fans. But one thing that Pocono hopes is that it will continue to have a Cup race and inspire other sporting facilities to also dedicate resources to go green.

May concluded, “We have a pretty neat ecosystem here.”