Chicago Street Race Is A High-Stress Affair For NASCAR Cup Drivers

Story By: REID SPENCER / NASCAR – CHICAGO, IL – The Chicago Street Course isn’t a typical road course.

In fact, it isn’t even a typical street course, given the level of treachery in several of the high-speed corners—notably Turns 1, 5 and 6.

There is no margin for error in those corners. Miss the apex by a small margin, and you’ll head straight into tire barriers, with little hope of continuing without assistance.

“Yeah, it’s different in its own way,” said Trackhouse Racing’s Shane van Gisbergen, who won the inaugural Chicago Street Race in his 2023 NASCAR debut. “The hardest part here is the no runoff … like Turn 1 and Turn 5. Going straight into a wall at the biggest braking zones is pretty daunting.

“So, yeah, normally you have runoff in the tricky corners, so that’s probably the hardest part about this place.”

Defending NASCAR Cup champion Joey Logano, who finished eighth in the inaugural Chicago Street Race and 23rd last year, acknowledged the risk inherent in turning high-speed laps on the 2.2-mile, 12-turn circuit.

“When you look at Turns 1 and 6, you have no runoff, so there aren’t many street courses that I know of at least, where you have long straightaways with literally no runoff, so the risk is huge here,” Logano said. “When you go to push it, you send it in there a little bit too far, and we’ve seen that’s where a car goes straight right into the tire barrier.

“You don’t have the ability to make mistakes and just turn around and get back going again. It’s a little different than other road courses, where a lot of times you’ll maybe overdrive the car to find the limits in practice and stuff like that. You can’t afford to do that here.”

Road course ace Michael McDowell agreed that the layout of the circuit puts extraordinary stress on the NASCAR Cup Series drivers, who will compete in the Grant Park 165 on Sunday (2 p.m. ET on TNT, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

“There’s just a very condensed schedule,” McDowell said. “So I feel like you’re at that 80-85 percent in practice, and you’re getting your rhythm, and you are hitting your marks, then you’re pushing yourself a little bit more and a little bit more.

“Then you go qualify, and you throw all that out the window and just put it on the edge. You have to do that for a few laps here, I feel like. So it’s an adrenaline rush, but it is stressful though.

“You never feel like you put your guard down, you stay very tense, you stay very locked in that high level of concentration, because it’s an inch left or right and you miss it. But it’s fun when you get it right.”

Future of Chicago Street Race is still up in the air

The current contract between NASCAR and the City of Chicago ends with this year’s Grant Park 165 Chicago Street Race (2 p.m. ET Sunday on TNT, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

There’s a two year mutual option that could extend the event, if both NASCAR and the city deem it worthwhile to do so.

As of yet, nothing has been decided.

“We have those two option years, and we’ve had great conversations with the city,” said Chicago Street Race president Julie Giese. “Our focus is on July 5 and 6 (this year).

“We have some time after the race to have those conversations, so we’re just going to focus on having the best street race we possibly can.”

Denny Hamlin, pole winner for the inaugural race, advocated for the return of the event next year.

“I personally would like to see them do everything they can to keep it here,” Hamlin said. “I’d like to see the city rally behind this race. I could just tell you that non-racing fans at the hotel I’m staying at are talking about the race. I think that it’s certainly got some sort of economic impact to the city itself.

“We’re certainly exposing some new fans to this. I think it’s very important. I think you try everything you can to get this thing back here in Chicago, because I believe it is an important place for us. I still would like to see Chicagoland (Speedway), not as a substitute for this race. I’d like to see us run both.”

Chicagoland, a 1.5-mile intermediate speedway in Joliet, Ill., last hosted a NASCAR Cup Series race in 2019.

Ty Dillon likes his chances in second round of In-Season Challenge

After upsetting top seeded Denny Hamlin in the first round of the In-Season Challenge last Sunday at EchoPark Speedway, Ty Dillon fired the parting shot heard ‘round the NASCAR world.

“For all you Denny fans out there, I just knocked your favorite driver out,” Dillon said, borrowing a turn of phrase Hamlin himself made famous.

Dillon, the 32nd seed, acknowledged Saturday that he had planned the trash talk after Hamlin crashed out of the Atlanta race on Lap 69.

“It was planned when I knew he was eliminated,” Dillon said. “When I knew we had him, I told (pit reporter) Mamba (Smith) for the interview, I said, ‘Hey, give me a second after this interview, I got something to say.’

“So, somewhat spontaneous, I guess you could call it that, but it was there. It was always there, and I just wanted to lean into it a little bit.”

Dillon will face 17th seed Brad Keselowski in the second round on the Chicago Street Course, and he likes his chances against the 2012 series champion.

“Honestly, I feel good,” he said. “We’re going to do our best starting today and all through the race tomorrow to put pressure on him. This is a place that, if you feel like you can pressure people, they can make mistakes.

“Obviously, you’re seeing in practice in Xfinity cars, a little bit more (aggression) can get you in a lot of trouble. And I enjoy road course racing. We ran really good in Mexico City, another one of the races that we ran up front. A lot of people credit it to being good in the rain, but we also ran really well when it turned dry, too.”