{"id":141413,"date":"2025-08-13T04:01:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T04:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/141413\/"},"modified":"2025-08-13T04:01:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T04:01:10","slug":"nascar-driver-mcdowell-relishes-super-unique-chance-to-race-on-navy-base","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/141413\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR driver McDowell relishes ‘super unique’ chance to race on Navy base"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"A<\/a>NASCAR driver Michael McDowell in Barrio Logan Tuesday. (Photo by Luis Monteagudo Jr.)<\/p>\n

San Diego is about to feel the need. The need for speed.<\/p>\n

And race car driver Michael McDowell<\/a> is planning to bring it in 2026 when NASCAR takes over Coronado<\/a> for a special series of races called \u201cNASCAR San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be, you know, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

McDowell, who won the 2021 Daytona 500, visited San Diego Tuesday to promote next June\u2019s race and meet with some of his sponsors at K1 Speed Indoor Go Karts in Barrio Logan.<\/p>\n

Coronado was chosen for the event to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the U. S. Navy. The races will take place at Naval Air Station North Island.<\/p>\n

The base was one of many San Diego area locations used in the shooting of Top Gun, the film in which star Tom Cruise uttered his iconic \u201cspeed\u201d line.<\/p>\n

NASCAR officials said San Diego was a natural locale for the extension of their efforts to expand interest in the sport, which has led to races in Chicago and Mexico City.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the ideas that we had several years ago was to race on a military base,\u201d said NASCAR Executive Vice President Ben Kennedy at a press conference last month announcing the event.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve had a number of conversations with bases across the country. We also wanted to find a way to have a presence back here in the Southern California market. We\u2019ve had racing and auto club for a number of years at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum. We felt like it was a good opportunity for us to get back to our fans here in the greater Southern California region.\u201d<\/p>\n

McDowell has been racing competitively since the age of three, starting with BMX bicycles and moving on to karts, open wheel cars and stock cars. McDowell, now 40, is looking forward to competing in the NASCAR cup series race in Coronado, one of three races planned for the weekend.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike, we\u2019ve never been on a Navy base before, so just the coolness of you know, just something super unique,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd obviously, the course layout will be very unique, because there\u2019s nothing like it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The challenge will be in racing in a place not built for speeding cars.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re gonna have some asphalt,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re gonna have some concrete. You\u2019re gonna have some transitions. You\u2019re gonna have some dips. You\u2019re gonna have some, you know, drainage and water runoff and all those things. So, it\u2019s not your typical racetrack.\u201d<\/p>\n

Officials are still figuring out the exact route of the race in San Diego. No matter the route, McDowell said the excitement will be felt beyond Coronado.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cHopefully we\u2019re able to, you know, generate new fans and have new opportunities to get in front of people that maybe haven\u2019t experienced the sport before,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NASCAR driver Michael McDowell in Barrio Logan Tuesday. (Photo by Luis Monteagudo Jr.) San Diego is about to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":141414,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,5218,1582,276,17535,25434,1406,84260,3549,7264,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-141413","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-auto-racing","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-coronado","13":"tag-michael-mcdowell","14":"tag-nascar","15":"tag-naval-air-station-north-island","16":"tag-san-diego","17":"tag-sandiego","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-united-states-of-america","20":"tag-unitedstates","21":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","22":"tag-us","23":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115019466982254371","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/141414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}