Anyone who has gone for an evening romp in Lower Broadway knows full well the bombardment and boisterousness of Nashville, Tennessee’s nightlife, which commodifies and materializes the city’s culture of country music writ large.
For over a century, Nashville has been one of the most prominent hubs of stock car racing in all the United States, and has enjoyed one of the deepest symbiotic relationships that NASCAR has had with any market.
And yet, the very fact that NASCAR is racing in Nashville this weekend is a remarkable one.
After first opening in 1904, the Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway near the city’s downtown hosted NASCAR Cup Series races from 1958 until 1984, and then hosted what is now the NASCAR Xfinity Series and Camping World Truck Series in the late 1980s and 1990s.
But a decade ago, both the grassroots tradition of Nashville racing and its NASCAR prospects teetered on the brink of oblivion: Late in 2010, Nashville mayor Karl Dean sought to shut down the Nashville Fairgrounds, and to tear down the speedway and accompanying flea market in order to redevelop the site.
But while Herculean efforts were made at the grassroots level to save the Fairgrounds from demolition, it turned out that NASCAR was on its way out of town altogether: Due to attendance issues and few prospects of a Cup Series race, Nashville Superspeedway was shut down following its 2011 slate of races.
But late in the 2010s, as the Nashville market began to experience explosive population & economic growth, whispers of NASCAR looking to re-enter the market became louder and louder: First, Speedway Motorsports Inc.
This season, three new NASCAR teams based in the Nashville area are competing full-time across their national series: Trackhouse Racing in the Cup Series, Scott Borchetta’s Big Machine Racing in the Xfinity Series, and Allen’s Rackley W.A.R.
“The thing about Nashville is there’s so much growth happening and it’s such an experience town and entertainment town, and entertainment and experience is the cornerstone of what racing is,” Trackhouse co-owner Justin Marks told CBS Sports.
“This is a sports town, this is an entertainment town.
While Trackhouse currently prepares their cars in North Carolina while running its business out of Franklin, Tennessee, Marks is eyeing a future base of operations in downtown Nashville to serve as both a race shop and a “motorsports-themed public-facing attraction.” Work towards revitalizing the Fairgrounds Speedway continues, with NASCAR great Dale Earnhardt Jr.
“We’ve got a great group of guys and girls who work here that are very knowledgeable in racing and hard workers,” Allen said.
“I think that if Trackhouse can pull this off, demonstrated to the industry that they can get more creative with their operations.
Years after an existential crisis that threatened its very existence, the return of NASCAR has made anything seem possible for Nashville as a racing city.