Scott Borchetta Confirms IndyCar Not Returning To Nashville In 2027

When the 2027 NTT IndyCar Series schedule is released on Friday, October 23, Nashville Superspeedway will not be included.

Scott Borchetta, the Founder of Big Machine who was actively involved in that event as both a promoter and sponsor, confirmed the news on October 22.

“SMI & NSS have been great partners in hosting the Borchetta Bourbon Music City Grand Prix for the last three years,” Borchetta told me via text message. “But the original vision for the Grand Prix still stands - to become ‘The Monaco of the South’. If we don’t put our complete focus and investment into returning downtown, it won’t happen. IndyCar and FOX love Nashville and there is a great desire to return to its downtown streets.”

SMI is Speedway Motorsports, Inc. and NSS is Nashville Superspeedway, which is owned by SMI. The past three years, the NTT IndyCar Series has competed at the 1.33-mile. Penske Entertainment was the track promoter for the past two years and Borchetta switched to sponsoring the race after serving as the promoter in 2024.

It was the site of the IndyCar Championship finale in 2024 and 2025, but as moved to July to immediately follow the FIFA World Cup Championship with FOX broadcasting both events.

The lead-in of the World Cup was expected to create a huge rating, but those plans were foiled by the weather, first with lightning delaying the race and sending all cars back to the garage followed by a heavy rainstorm.

The race was moved to Monday afternoon and still drew respectable television viewership, despite being on a workday.

IndyCar Success In Nashville Tied To Downtown City Streets

But when the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix was launched in 2021, it was on the streets of downtown Nashville. The race course included the Korean War Veterans Memorial Bridge, part of Broadway, and circling around the outside of Nissan Stadium, home of the NFL’s Tennessee Titans.

The downtown spectacle combined high-speed racing, along with entertainment when track activity concluded. It drew big crowds, created a huge buzz and even had racing legend Mario Andretti tell me, “This event is going to be our Long Beach of the East.”

Once construction for a new stadium for the Titans began, however, the course became a work zone. Borchetta drew up a new layout, which still including part of the stadium area. When the race was moved to the last event of the season, Borchetta could not get any guarantee from the NFL that the Titans would be on the road that weekend.

Borchetta and IndyCar switched the event to Nashville Superspeedway in Lebanon, Tennessee, about a 45-minute drive from the heart of Nashville.

NFL Scheduling In Nashville Creating Major Conflicts For IndyCar Race

In May 2024, the NFL scheduled a Titans on the same weekend, so Borchetta to and IndyCar were fortunate with the move, because the entire race would have been canceled.

Despite Borchetta’s aggressive promotion, it was not a sellout. Penske Entertainment became the promoters the following year and although the IndyCar racing on the ovals proved very exciting, it remained a challenge from an attendance standpoint.

I asked Borchetta if he still intended to be active in IndyCar and he told me, “I don’t love the sport any less.”

Washington DC Also Leaves As IndyCar Goes International

Also dropped from the 2027 NTT IndyCar Series schedule is a return to the streets of Washington, DC, but that was expected. The Freedom 250 Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. on August 22-23 was always designed as a “one-time-only” celebration of the 250^th Birthday of the United States, not an ongoing addition to the IndyCar Series schedule. The permit process of dealing with so many different governmental agencies and the cost to create the track made it unfeasible to be a regular part of the schedule.

When the 2027 schedule is released, a race in Spain is highly expected to be included, with an announcement from Catalonia, Spain taking place on Friday morning.

That gives IndyCar its first race outside of North America since Sao Palou in 2013. But the loss of Nashville takes away a big market that was an easy drive for IndyCar’s Midwestern fan base. Borchetta is hopeful that one day it returns to the streets of Nashville, as it was originally envisioned.

This article was originally published on Forbes.com