“It’s All Dead and Not Pretty”: Fans Plead NASCAR to Make Major Sonoma Change in Race Calendar

Amid the sprawling southern Sonoma Mountains lies a hilly 2.52-mile road course by the name of Sonoma Raceway. This beloved track in Sears Point is as pretty as a picture early in the year, covered in luscious greens and caressed by pleasing winds. But that’s not when NASCAR decides to go race at it. Instead, it goes when the region is all dead and dry in the summer.

The Sonoma Raceway first appeared on a NASCAR schedule in 1989. It disappeared in 2019 and then reappeared in 2021. Over all these years, stock car racing fans have only got to witness the beautiful layout on its bad hair day. Track employees recently posted a recently taken picture of the road course on X and wrote, “We might not have snow, but we do have this.”

The desire to be in the stands in the middle of such a setting overwhelmed fans, and they expressed their hearts below the post. One wrote, “I’m trying to figure out why NASCAR doesn’t come here when it’s nice and green early in the season Vs dead summer, and it’s all dead and not pretty.” Many had a similar line of questions.

Another said, “Yep… @nascar needs to go when it looks like this instead of the damn dust bowl it is whenever we show up…” In the upcoming season, the Cup Series field will race at the track on July 13. By then, all the greenery will be replaced by hot dust, as fans lament. “Such a shame NASCAR only shows up when it’s all dead,” one comment complained.

Yet another fan said, “I wished NASCAR raced here earlier in the year than in the summer, just so we can see the beautiful green.” Does this mean fans aren’t fond of watching races at Sonoma? Absolutely not.

How the 2024 Cup Series race in Sonoma became a fan favorite

Last year, drivers raced on a freshly paved surface at Sonoma. The track caused issues early on in the race, but as temperatures soared and the surface rubbered in, an interesting spectacle began unfolding. The road course made cars go faster than usual and brought forward several cautions that influenced the outcome.

Kyle Larson eventually won the race and secured what was his third victory of the season at the time. Denny Hamlin later spoke about the cautions on his podcast and said, “We haven’t seen cautions like this on a road course in quite some time. Just cold tires, cold track and people just trying to get after it.”

“In practice, we give each other space. New repaves are always treacherous because the tires usually are so hard that it takes time to build heat in them.” Sonoma won’t be so new this July. Will fans see another race similar to the last one or will the hilly venue throw a different challenge? The answers are loading.