IndyCar’s fall to third in motor sports should be studied in business classes
What once was the most profitable, proud and distinguished racing brand in America has been reduced to a glorified weekend picnic, and something to do for patrons rather than something to follow.
A concept that was inconceivable just 10 years ago is now a fact: IndyCar, a series that was lapped years ago by NASCAR, has fallen behind Formula One in the United States.
True story: In 2022, when Texas Motor Speedway hosted an IndyCar race, one of the senior officials at the track asked that I not cover it. And we got along well. The person knew the attendance was going to be awful, and he asked that I skip the race because he knew it was going to be a bad look.
IndyCar returns to North Texas for the first time since 2023 with Sunday’s Grand Prix of Arlington, an event that goes against what this series once stood for but now is used to save America’s largest open wheel racing organization.
As professional sports boomed over the last 30 years, none hit the wall harder than IndyCar, a series that is now reinventing itself to keep its place on a track that it once owned.
Where IndyCar is in 2026
The IndyCar schedule started March 1, and features 18 races, the final on Sept. 6. Just in time to avoid scheduling conflicts with football.
Of those 18 races, only five are ovals; the biggest, the Indianapolis 500, keeps IndyCar relevant on our overcrowded sports calendar. The Indy 500 is the start of summer, a tourist attraction no different than the Kentucky Derby. People will make the pilgrimage to see the Indy 500 because it remains one of universally agreed Seven Wonders of Sports.
The final minutes leading into the start of that race, and its first five laps, are a sensory experience offered by no other sporting event in the world.
After that, IndyCar has become a poor man’s version of the glitzy, sexy Formula One, which now features three races in the United States, the most of any nation on its circuit. After decades of trying to create an audience in America, F1, through clever marketing and some luck, is stable in America.
F1 races are now carried exclusively by Apple TV, as the series has leaned into streaming.
IndyCar’s owner, longtime racing magnate Roger Penske, sold a one-third stake in the series to the Fox Corporation in July 2025, thus ensuring its races will be carried on a major network for the foreseeable future. Whether people are watching is a different argument, but it’s live programming, and used to fill the slower times on the sports schedule.
How IndyCar became F1 lite
Every word, sentence and paragraph that has written and said about the collapse of America’s open wheel racing started because of IndyCar’s famous split with CART, a feud that decimated the sport from 1996 to 2008.
The irony is CART was the series of the future, but nepo baby Tony George owned the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, which gave him the leverage in a power play that put the sport in a compactor. He started a well-meaning IndyCar series that focused on “affordable” cars, American drivers, American engines and oval tracks.
American open wheel racing still has not recovered from Tony George’s “win.” Today, IndyCar is mostly road courses featuring drivers from all over the world who drive basically two engines, Honda or Chevrolet. And in 2019 he sold both the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and the series, to the man who was once his “enemy” — Penske.
There is still an audience for IndyCar, but it’s a fraction of a fraction. Rather than race ovals, IndyCar has embraced most of CART’s path, and to follow F1’s formula. An IndyCar race is actually a good product with approachable drivers, but it’s been poorly marketed, and its media strategies have missed.
A road course’s draw is that the fan can attend the event while not feeling pressured to watch it. It’s similar to the evolution of professional golf, be it the PGA Tour or LIV; it’s a gathering that sells to casual viewers who are looking for something to do while not being invested in the outcome.
But unlike the F1 fan who is deeply invested in all parts of the race, the IndyCar fan is more apt to be keen on the food trucks, live music opportunities or the weather rather than who is in the lead.
Thanks to the Indy 500, IndyCar will always have the opportunity to catch the leaders of this sport, but for now it’s a distant third.
This story was originally published March 15, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
