NASCAR Cup driver Noah Gragson is hoping to take advantage of some character building this Sunday at Iowa Speedway.
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The Las Vegas native, who just turned 27 two weeks ago on July 15, currently sits 34th in the NASCAR Cup standings, driving for Front Row Motorsports.
It’s been a rough season for Gragson to date in 2025: he has zero wins, one top-five and three top-10 finishes in 22 starts, with his best finish being fourth at Talladega. But Gragson is optimistic he’ll have a strong performance this Sunday in America’s heartland, having made numerous starts at Iowa in his career, particularly across all three major NASCAR series:
- In the Cup Series, he has just one prior start, with a 16th-place finish last season during his one-year tenure with the now-defunct Stewart-Haas Racing.
- In the Xfinity Series, he has two starts, finishing 4th and 6th in 2019.
- And in the Truck Series, he has two other starts to his credit, with finishes of second place (2018) and sixth (2017).
He also has several starts at the 7/8-mile oval short track earlier in his career in the K&N Series. Add all those races together and Gragson has a pretty good feel and handle for the track.
He’s especially looking forward to this year’s race after the track was partially repaved last year, with the major repaved areas being the entrances and exits to all four turns, most notably Turns 2 and 4 which needed the brunt of the repave operation.
“I’m excited to get to Iowa this weekend. It’s always been a fun track and one I’ve had circled on the calendar for a while,” Gragson said. “I’ve got a lot of history there, going back to my K&N days in 2015.
“Last year we were fastest in practice, but loose in qualifying which caught us off guard. Everyone was slipping and sliding on the new asphalt. The corners were really dark where they repaved, but it’s lightened up quite a bit since then.
“What makes tracks like Iowa so great is how they age, the hot summers and freezing winters build character over time, and that’s what gives them their unique challenges. Iowa is a place I love going to and I’m looking forward to the weekend.”
The repave made the track more competitive
Drivers feared the partial repave would impact the quality of racing and lead to single file, follow the leader racing. As it turned out, less than one month after the repave, the NASCAR Cup Series returned to the track and the race that took place was one of the most exciting events the track has ever seen.
Former NASCAR driver and current TV analyst Jeff Burton agrees with Gragson about the repaving of the Rusty Wallace-designed and NASCAR-owned track, saying it has made for better driving.
Burton told the Des Moines Register recently, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bad race there. I love this racetrack. I was super excited when they announced they were going to have a Cup race here.”
