NASCAR adds Mexico City to 2025 Cup, Xfinity schedules

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NASCAR announced it will take the Cup Series to Mexico City next year with a summer date on the same track where Formula 1 competes.

The NASCAR Xfinity Series will also race at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in a return for that series to the track where it raced at from 2005-2008.

But this time, the Cup Series drivers will come as well for the June 14-15 race weekend for the first international Cup race since July 18, 1958 at Canadian Exposition Stadium in Toronto. The NASCAR Mexico Series — the sanctioning body’s regional series in Mexico — also will race as part of a Saturday doubleheader with Xfinity. 

“Our biggest opportunity to grow as a sport is international,” NASCAR Executive Vice President Ben Kennedy said. “Certainly, U.S. is always going to be kind of our mainstay. … It’s important [to be here] as we certainly think about our fan base, but then also think about the future pipeline of drivers, crew chiefs, engineers, making sure that we give them a pathway from the NASCAR Mexico Series into our national series and potentially even our Cup Series, to create the next generation of our sport.”

Kennedy, nephew of NASCAR Chairman Jim France and the France family member expected to eventually oversee the entire sport, has spearheaded NASCAR’s schedule and innovation when it comes to scheduling. Putting a temporary quarter-mile oval into the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and conducting a race on the streets of Chicago have been some of his recent achievements.

Those events also have given NASCAR the credibility that it could replicate those events internationally, but NASCAR opted to go to the track where it raced decades ago and is iconic in the world of racing as the site of Mexico’s Formula 1 race. NASCAR will use a 14-turn course, eliminating a few turns that F1 uses but it mostly will be the same.

“As we look at scheduling just in totality, we’re always looking at a plethora of different venues and now that we’ve been on street courses, frankly, just markets anywhere in the world,” Kennedy said. “We vetted a number of markets internationally.

“Naturally, this one was the best fit for us. They put on massive events here with huge crowds. We have experience racing here. It’s a track that is in really good condition and meets all of our standards. It was kind of the perfect place for us to land.”

The L.A. Coliseum event won’t return next year after its three-year run. NASCAR also experimented with a Cup race on dirt placed on the Bristol surface for a few years in a race that got mixed reviews.

“I’ll give them a lot of credit — they’ve been really trying to switch it up over the last few years,” said 2020 Cup champion Chase Elliott. “And I don’t think all of it’s gone great, and that’s totally OK, but they’ve been willing to try.

“And I think that that is something that that we should all admire and appreciate is the effort to go to different places and try new things. … To get outside of the country and just to go do something different, I think will be fun.”

Kennedy confirmed that Richmond Raceway would lose one of its two Cup weekends to make room for Mexico City on the schedule.

“We’re still committed to Richmond,” Kennedy said. “It’s an important track, important market, as we think about where our NASCAR fans are today. We’ve seen some exciting storylines certainly come out of that track over the past few years.”

He also did confirm that Kyle Busch, who won the 2008 Xfinity race at Mexico City, will be allowed into Mexico to race.

The two-time Cup champion was detained in January 2023 when he was trying to leave the country and had a handgun in his bag, which he said he forgot was in there and he has a permit to carry in the United States.

He agreed to plead guilty and adjudicated under a section of Mexican law that allows any prison sentence to be commuted if it is under four years, allowing him to leave the country by paying a $1,000 fine and an undisclosed bond. 

“We’ve had a couple of communications certainly with the team and the issues have been resolved, so we don’t foresee any challenges there,” Kennedy said. “I’m sure Kyle is excited to be down here in Mexico City next year.”

Drives and teams are awaiting the full release of the schedule, which industry personnel are expecting to be announced Thursday. A NASCAR spokesman said he could not confirm that day for the long-awaited schedule release.

Several pieces of the 2025 schedule have already been announced:

-The preseason Clash Feb. 2 at Bowman Gray Stadium.

-The Daytona 500 to open the season Feb. 16.

-The all-star race will be at North Wilkesboro Speedway for the third consecutive year.

-Charlotte will have its traditional Memorial Day weekend race on May 25.

-Atlanta will move from the playoffs to open an in-season tournament on June 28.

-Chicago street course is contracted with the city for July 6.

-Phoenix will be the championship on Nov. 2.

Other notable changes that have been discussed but not yet confirmed by NASCAR as the scheduling process has taken several twists and turns:

-COTA to move to the third race of the season to start a West Coast swing that goes COTA, Phoenix and Las Vegas.

-Homestead playoff race to move to the regular season in March.

– Watkins Glen playoff date to move to August.

-Daytona returns to the regular-season finale (this year it is Darlington because of the way the calendar fell and the two-week Olympic break). Darlington returns to the playoff opener.

-Gateway to move from June to a first-round playoff race in September.

-New Hampshire to move from July to the quarterfinal-round playoff race in September.

-Talladega’s October playoff race will move to the semifinal round instead of the quarterfinal round.

-Easter weekend is the only Cup off-weekend during the season.

-Potential other tracks to see possible significant date changes: Michigan (to June), Sonoma (to July), Dover (to July) and Iowa (to August).

These changes could result in some different venues for Xfinity and truck races. The biggest addition, though, to both series will be a likely Easter weekend (Friday-Saturday) of racing at Rockingham (N.C.) Speedway.

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.

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