Max Verstappen ran a GT3 car. It was a busy weekend on the Iberian peninsula. Álex Palou was fastest in Indy Lights testing. The NASCAR Cup Series championship got significantly tighter, though it may be too little too late for one driver who has won a lot this season. Colton Herta is using hindsight. Cadillac is finalizing its driver lineups for 2027. Team Penske could be running a Cadillac at Le Mans in the not-too-distant-future. Josh Pierson was approved an IndyCar license and people are mad, or at least upset. Mad could be too strong. However, we are not talking about licenses today. We are discussing something IndyCar has stretched out for far too long.
Where is Phase Two?
On the verge of the inaugural Markham race, while the final quarter of the 2026 season was fully in motion, IndyCar did something rather uncommon, if not unprecedented in series history. IndyCar released the first phase of the 2027 calendar.
The first eight rounds were announced on August 13, where we learned the first half of next season was essentially unchanged from 2026, the stretch beginning with St. Petersburg in March to Detroit in June. Races moved a week here or there based on how certain dates fell, most notably Easter and Memorial Day. A spring gap remained but that has come to be expected in contemporary IndyCar. We had the first half of 2027 set and the expectation the second half would be ironed out shortly.
Over two months have passed since phase one was released. Where is phase two?
It felt like the 2027 calendar would be finalized around the final round. There was three weeks between phase one becoming public and the Laguna Seca finale. If the first half was locked down, the second half could not have been that far behind. Even if it was not released before the final race was concluded, IndyCar normally does not take long to release its next calendar once the offseason begins. The 2026 calendar was out a little over two weeks after the 2025 finale. We were spoiled when the 2025 calendar came out in June 2024.
The strange thing is all the rumors about the 2027 season involve events that are options to possible fill IndyCar’s spring gap, even though it sounded like the first half was set in stone. The rumors are not what are holding up the schedule release.
Barcelona keeps rumbling, as Circuit de Catalunya reportedly has interest in holding a round and a home race for Catalunya’s own Álex Palou. What started out as a slim hope has persisted long enough to think it has a realistic chance to appear on next year’s calendar. No date has been reported, but conventional wisdom points to late-April or early-May, the period when IndyCar current has three weekends without races.
It is also a time of year when Barcelona has historically hosted a Formula One grand prix. In 2027, Barcelona is not on the Formula One calendar, as it begins a yearly rotation with Spa-Francorchamps. That part of spring is also a time when Formula One will be between racing in the Middle East and North America and before it starts its European portion of the season. Spring makes sense for IndyCar as its summer is usually packed, Barcelona is usually rather warm during the summer, and IndyCar likely would not want to end the season in Spain and prefer to end in the United States.
Other than Barcelona, it appears nothing possibly in the second half of next season is hanging up the remainder of the schedule being released. No rounds are being rumored for July and August. The only other toothless rumor is a chance IndyCar pairing with NASCAR to run at Texas, which is the weekend of May 2, and that could also fill the spring gap, but that hasn’t been seriously mentioned. It has mostly been floated as a theoretical to fill spring. Nothing points to Texas becoming a reality.
A few pieces have trickled out. Gateway did release it would remain in mid-June, even if it wanted to keep that a secret a little longer, and Road America announced it would be the last Sunday in June. Essentially the first ten races are confirmed. What is taking so long to confirm the final six or seven weekends?
There really are not going to be any surprises. Mid-Ohio will be on the schedule. Nothing suggested Portland was hosting its final IndyCar round when IndyCar visited this past August. Markham just started a five-year contract. The series is committed to Milwaukee and there was no sign this year IndyCar was looking to move on. It sounded like Laguna Seca would be back and likely remain the finale for 2027 when IndyCar closed out this season.
All that leaves from the 2026 season unaccounted for are Nashville and Washington, D.C.
The Music City Grand Prix promoters sounded dissuaded after this year's oval show at Nashville Superspeedway and wants to return the race to downtown Nashville. The ongoing stadium construction on the banks of the Cumberland River make a street race return rather difficult at this time. It is hard to draw people to Lebanon, Tennessee, but Nashville Superspeedway is the only option other than scuttling the entire event. Is there a fight to keep the event alive with IndyCar taking on more of the operational costs with it on the oval? Could an alternate street course layout be in the works that avoids the construction area?
Nothing is known. For all this waiting on the second half of the calendar, there has been no rumbles on what is causing the delays and what events are in what type of limbo. Losing Nashville would be a knock on IndyCar, and this calendar delay only makes any potential change more disastrous.
Then there is Washington, D.C., which drew plenty of interest and was a remarkable achievement for the series considering the event came together in about eight month's time from announcement to green flag for the opening session. While it was IndyCar's second-most visible event of the season, it also cost $35 million to put on, and there does not seem to be a desire for federal funding to keep that event alive... but I am sure after pulling off the race this year and the buzz IndyCar received, it desperately wants what was planned to be a one-off to become a staple event.
Some of these final details take time to work out, and IndyCar does have about four-and-a-half months left in its offseason, but delaying the release of the remainder of the calendar only barriers it under a great pile of clutter. IndyCar has already been out of the spotlight for over a month. IndyCar is also IndyCar. How many people are aware when next season's calendar is released before the current season is over? Nothing may matter, but it is surely not the plan to have the calendar drag out this far into the offseason.
We still have over a month to Thanksgiving and the holiday season. Any track wishing to do holiday ticket deals still have time, but for a handful of events, it is getting close and they do not have their dates set yet.
We do know over half the schedule at this point, and most of the unannounced rounds we know will be on the schedule, we just don't know the exact dates and what race number they will fall on the calendar. This should work out, but for a series that struggles for attention and being seen, dragging out confirming next year's calendar this deep into the offseason and autumn is a little ridiculous.
Last year, IndyCar announced a calendar and then Washington, D.C. was added in January, not usually when events are announced for the upcoming season, but it came with the circumstances of the event. If we can wait until January to announce one event, we can announce what races are confirmed and wait for the final pieces to fall whether they need a few more weeks or a few more months.
If four races are known and two are still being ironed out, give us the four and we will sit on the fence for the other two. The late announcement of Washington, D.C. surely did not hurt the interest in that event. Both days were packed with spectators and it still earned IndyCar its most viewership outside the Indianapolis 500 in over 30 years. If the series must wait until January again to confirm that race, I am sure the series and event will be fine.
Everything will work out, but this long delay for phase two of the calendar places IndyCar in a spot where its 2027 calendar will be lost as the days grow colder and shorter. No one is looking for IndyCar at this moment, and most will not realize when the 2027 calendar will officially be confirmed, unless IndyCar makes a big bang with its schedule announcement, and I have my hesitations that IndyCar will do such a thing.
That is not how it should be, especially if the calendar is going to be almost entirely unchanged from last season. It is one thing if there was something completely unexpected added and that was the hang up. Confirming what we already got should not take this long. Two months has been plenty of time to confirm the second half of the calendar, and yet the wait continues for the final piece of the puzzle.
Champions From the Weekend
Toyota clinched the FIA World Endurance Championship manufacturers' championship with a victory for the #8 Toyota of Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ryō Hirakawa in the 6 Hours of Barcelona.
Toyota clinched the NASCAR Cup Series manufacturers' championship with Tyler Reddick's victory in the NASCAR Cup race from Phoenix, Reddick's sixth victory of the season.
Maro Engel and Lucas Auer clinched the GT World Challenge Europe drivers' championship when their third-place finish from the second Misano race during the Sprint Cup weekend was reinstated.
Winners From the Weekend
You know about Toyota, but did you know…
The #17 Mercedes-AMG Team GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG of Ralf Aron, Maximillian Götz and Fabian Schiller won the 3 Hours of Portimão.
Jesse Love won the NASCAR Grand National Series race from Phoenix, his second victory of the season. Kaden Honeycutt won the Truck race, his fourth victory of the season.
The #92 The Bend Manthey Racing Porsche of Ricard Lietz, Riccardo Pera and Yasser Shahin won in LMGT3 in the 6 Hours of Barcelona.
Nicolò Bulega swept the World Superbike races from Jerez. Albert Arenas and Jeremy Alcoba split the World Supersport races.
The #100 Team Kunimitsu Honda of Naoki Yamamoto and Tadasuke Makino won the Super GT race from Autopolis. The #96 K-tunes Racing Lexus of Morio Nitta and Shinichi Takagi won in GT300.
Coming Up This Weekend
Formula One is back for the United States Grand Prix.
MotoGP has one more visit to Phillip Island.
Supercars will run at Surfers Paradise.
NASCAR has a late visit to Talladega.
