IndyCar president addresses unpopular decision about 2026 race schedule

IndyCar president Doug Boles has addressed an unpopular decision the series took for its 2026 schedule. The series made the race at the 2.238-mile Laguna Seca road circuit the season finale, swapping out Nashville's oval spectacle to mid-July.

While some fans were upset with the decision because they felt an oval race was already a fitting way to end the season, others looked at the viewership numbers to show their dismay. The 2025 Borchetta Bourbon Music City GP in Nashville drew an average viewership of 1.142 million viewers on FOX, making it the fourth IndyCar race this season, apart from the prestigious Indy 500, to cross the one million mark.

This should surely have cemented Nashville's place as the season finale. However, IndyCar moved it up to July 19, the same day as the FIFA World Cup final, as a night race. This was a strategic decision to use the biggest soccer event on the planet as a lead-in to the IndyCar race on FOX.

In a recent interview on the racing series' YouTube channel, Doug Boles said he hoped fans would understand this.

"We heard from a lot of fans, 'Why didn't you leave Nashville? You need to end on the oval.' I hope fans understand why we did that," he said. "Our oval racing is so exciting. The race at Nashville is so exciting. So what we're going to do is we're gonna capture that fan who's watching the World Cup right into a really exciting start and exciting racing, and hopefully retain some of those fans to watch and then hopefully they become NTT IndyCar Series fans." "So we really wanted to put a race that was going to thrill people right there. And obviously, ovals, under the lights, Indy cars, Scott Borchetta (primary sponsor), Josef Newgarden's hometowns, I mean, it's going to be a great place for us," Boles added.

The 2025 season finale in Nashville was a spectacle, with 502 on-track passes, 284 of which were for position. Home hero Josef Newgarden broke his winless streak since Gateway in August 2024, to cap off an utterly disappointing season on a high note.

Doug Boles on why every fan needs to attend the tentpole IndyCar race at Laguna Seca

The IndyCar Java House Grand Prix of Monterey at Laguna Seca - Source: Getty

IndyCar's season finale will return to the WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in 2026, after a two-year gap, when Nashville brought down the curtains on the season. The 2.238-mile circuit is a historic place in racing history, adorned with the famous 'corkscrew' corner, which features a 59-foot drop.

Doug Boles shared in the aforementioned interview why it should be a 'bucket list' item for racing fans outside the Indy 500 or any race at the fabled Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

"It's a beautiful place, and I tell fans, if you haven't been, you need to go to Laguna Seca," Boles said. "It is one of those historic tracks, not just in the US, but in the world. And it puts on great racing, and the community there loves the racing."

Elaborating on the beauty of the place on the central coast of California, the 59-year-old added:

"There's so much to do - the restaurants, the beach, seeing the water, golf, I mean, there's so much to do. If there's a bucket list other than the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, then I would encourage people to do, you got to check out Laguna Seca."

Besides the rescheduling of Nashville and Laguna Seca, IndyCar also made three major additions to its 2026 schedule. It included the inaugural Arlington GP, a return to Phoenix for a double-header with NASCAR, and moving its race in Canada from Toronto to Markham.

Edited by Yash Kotak