How Arlington set “a new standard” for IndyCar events
- Archie O’Reilly
- 12 minutes ago
- 7 min read
A hidden gem. Untapped potential. Both phrases rife in the modern IndyCar landscape. This sense of an unfulfilled wonder of a product, poised for a breakout failing to come to pass.
But with one of its latest ventures, there is widespread adamance that IndyCar has raised its game to a new level. Spearheading the series’ plan of creating more tentpole events, particularly by thrusting itself into urban markets, the inaugural Grand Prix of Arlington - in collaboration with two major Texan sporting entities - has set a successful new benchmark.
“It’s a new standard,” claimed two-time IndyCar champion and 2018 Indianapolis 500 winner Will Power. “Every stand was full. It was totally, totally full. The track looked amazing. It just looked like a big event. This is setting a new standard of what our events should look like.
“Penske Entertainment, the Cowboys, the Rangers… the whole group is just amazing.”
Working alongside the Dallas Cowboys, an NFL powerhouse, and the MLB’s Texas Rangers, IndyCar designed a 2.73-mile, 14-turn track to run around the teams’ stadiums, created at the centre of the state’s major sports and entertainment district.
And these organisations’ involvement was not just a token. Jerry Jones, esteemed owner of the Cowboys - ranked Forbes’ most valuable sports team in the world every year since 2016 - was present at the event and appeared on FOX Sports’ impressive pre-race show.
There has appeared a total buy-in from all parties since the event was announced in October 2024, over 17 months ago. And since its inception, it has been continually promoted in a manner that should set another blueprint for IndyCar. That has included drivers present within the complex, including at Cowboys matches, multiple times for promotional purposes.
From a television standpoint, IndyCar’s new-for-2025 broadcast partners, FOX, raised awareness of the race from the outset, including during its NFL and MLB programming.
Just as significantly, such was the level of local awareness, there was a wholesale grandstand sellout for the first-ever Arlington race day on Sunday. Sports Business Journal also reported that the weekend set a record for merchandise sales at a non-Indy 500 event.
Both are major markers of the success for IndyCar’s intention to create bigger events by expanding into fresh markets, gaining fresh eyeballs in the process.
“Very impressive. Incredible,” said four-time champion Álex Palou, effervescent in his praise of the event. “Already on Friday [for practice], it felt like a big, big event. You can see the facility. You can see how the track was built. You can see we have a long street track, which is what we’ve been pushing for. It’s been a 10 out of 10.
“There’s nothing you can say that this was bad. The attendance was incredible. The fans were incredible. They stayed until the end. Everybody was just there being happy. It’s incredible to be part of this.”
There has long been a feeling that many of IndyCar’s races lack the feeling of being events. Much the opposite of Formula One, where almost every race is made to feel significant.
For IndyCar, the Indy 500 has always been and will always be far and away its biggest race. Rightly so. But beyond the 500 and Long Beach as a distant second-in-command, there has been a glaring absence of defined blue riband events and showcases on the calendar.
Arlington, in a similar mould to F1 in Miami - racing around the Dolphins’ Hard Rock Stadium - is already looking to buck that trend.
Foremost, the long-built anticipation around the race establishes a precedent that should be much more commonplace across the schedule. Beyond that, the general sense of event and make-up of the facility gave IndyCar a feeling of importance that has continually felt so important as a vehicle to allow the sport to flourish.
“It’s incredible to race in such a central location [around] two of the biggest sports teams in the world,” assessed Kyle Kirkwood, winner of the inaugural Grand Prix of Arlington. “It’s been an incredible event. This event was done right.
“The track was built properly, with the fencing, the walls, the branding. It looked clean, exactly how a premier motorsports race should look like at a street course.
“I was talking to Doug [Boles, IndyCar president] before the race; there were some numbers in there that were Indy 500-like numbers for us. I could see this being one of our marquee events outside of the 500 in a very short period of time if we continue coming back here.”
On track, some drivers may have expected the surface to have been smoother than it was - or possibly even repaved in sections. But as it was, a street circuit of impressive variation in its corner profiles and speeds retained the authenticity of IndyCar’s raw brand of racing given its bumpiness and roughness in parts.
While some of the bumps, particularly down the schedule’s longest straight at 0.9 miles on the run down to Turn 10, were possibly too aggressive, there felt a healthy enough balance of buttoned-up presentation and preservation of IndyCar-fitting character.
“IndyCar has done a tremendous job with the whole organisation of [the event],” affirmed pole-sitter Marcus Ericsson. “The build of the track, it looks spectacular. It looks really well-made. It looks great on TV.
“It’s a fantastic track to drive because it’s very technical, it’s very tricky. It’s bumpy but it’s bumpy in that sort of characteristic way, which really is IndyCar racing for me. It’s supposed to be bumpy and different surfaces through the corner phases.
“It’s very difficult and that is really in IndyCar’s DNA. We need more tracks like this. It really raises the standard of IndyCar racing.”
After Friday’s opening practice session - IndyCar’s first running on the track - Scott McLaughlin, despite his experience on a vast number of street tracks across IndyCar and V8 Supercars, went as far as immediately crediting the track as his favourite within the genre.
“You probably think I’m getting paid to say it but it’s hands down the best street circuit that I’ve driven on,” he insisted. “It’s got a huge straight, bumpy straight. Then there are so many corners that are technical but also daring. There’s spots where it’s really tough to brake into. You’ve got to maximise high-speed corners, high-speed entries.
“It’s an absolute blast. It’s just got so much character. It’s a lot of fun.”
Sometimes, a criticism laid at the door of IndyCar’s street tracks is a lack of difference between each of them. Even though the constant jeopardy brings entertainment, drivers do not always enjoy repeated 90-degree corners and their stop-start nature.
But Arlington was far from that, which the drivers embraced from the outset.
“I love it. It’s insane,” Palou admitted. “It’s just a lot more fun than I thought. There’s so many different corners. There’s corners that you can attack so much and you feel like a superhero; there’s other corners where you need to back off because the grip is very different. A lot more bumpy than I thought, which makes it super challenging. But super fun.”
The track was narrow and technical at points - but in a way that flowed and was enjoyable to drive. It was perilous but, with no caution until Christian Rasmussen broke down with three laps left, not chaos-inducing, as was the case at new Nashville and Detroit street events.
There were also plenty of areas wide enough to encourage passing, including braking zones at the end of numerous straights. Overtaking seemed somewhat tough to execute but was possible - with 150 position passes recorded - and the drivers’ creativity was certainly tested.
It was this invention that won Kirkwood the race, with a surprise overtake on Palou that the Spaniard coined as “awesome” into Turn 14. And ultimately, while it may have initially been something of a slow-burner, Kirkwood’s chase of Palou and another strategic frenzy made the race a captivating enough watch.
“My expectations for this event were super high because of all the people that is involved on making it,” Palou explained. “I saw all the ideas that they had, all the renderings and stuff. That’s very easy to do. This has exceeded [expectations] by 10 times, this event in general.
“Obviously there’s always stuff you can improve. There’s bumps you can avoid having. [But] by far this is the best street course race I’ve been a part of. It’s really fun to see so many people in the stands. The energy was incredible. I cannot wait to be back next year.”
For a first-year event, there were impressively few hiccups. A catering team finding their way on to track at the start of a group session in Practice 2 was not ideal. Nor was Power running into a spun Scott Dixon, without seeming to clearly spot any yellow flags before a blind corner. Having fake kerbs painted, only to be cut by drivers, was aesthetically annoying too.
But criticisms are few and far between. And at the end of it, race day ran remarkably seamlessly and those at the event appeared to leave entirely enamoured by the experience. It was a resounding success in almost all quarters.
“This is a great event by any stretch, let alone for a first-year event,” said TWG Motorsports CEO Dan Towriss, inclusive of Andretti Global and the new Cadillac F1 team. “A big part of what makes this event special here in Arlington is Jerry Jones’ family, the organisation, the Dallas Cowboys, the Texas Rangers, all the people involved in supporting this event.
“Everybody knows they do it right. After finishing the weekend, they did it right.”
Those inside the paddock are already longing to return for next year’s second running - and for IndyCar to persist in pushing for more events of this magnitude to continue widening the awareness of the series beyond just the staple of the Indy 500.
The bar has now been raised and it is down to IndyCar to capitalise.
“It’s absolutely a big race on the circuit,” Towriss continued. “A number of owners have said they’d love to see this model replicated more and more. We think this is a model that could be replicated and lead to successful events in IndyCar.
“We’ve known that IndyCar is some of the best racing in motorsports for a long time. To showcase that, you need big events - events like this event. It was a tremendous success. We need more of these kinds of events. This is definitely a showpiece in the series.”
