Stat Sheet: Was Iowa The Best Short Track On NASCAR’s 2024 Schedule? (2024)

Both NASCAR Cup Series drivers and crew chiefs gave rave reviews to their inaugural race at Iowa Speedway.

The 2024 event was 18 years in the making on a track length (0.875 miles) found at no other oval on the schedule.

“Really cool to do a Cup race here in Iowa,” said Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., a previous Iowa winner in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. “After all our success and to do it in front of a great crowd.”

And of course, race winner Ryan Blaney was in love with the facility – along with 80 of his family members and closest friends who came down to see the race.

“The crowd tonight was awesome,” Blaney said. “Packed house. (If) that doesn’t make you want to come back here, I don’t know what will.”

Of course, having an enthusiastic crowd and teams excited about the racing helps a lot. But how did Iowa Speedway rank this year in terms of the competition?

The answers showcase why this oval should, in theory, be added to the schedule for years to come. Not only did the race pass the “smell test,” creating side-by-side action throughout its 350 laps, but some of the base level statistics left it above most other short tracks we’ve visited this year.

Let’s start with lead changes and get a little generous with the “short track” misnomer. We’ll include all tracks just over a mile or less, adding in places like Dover Motor Speedway and Phoenix Raceway, site of the championship finale.

Most Lead Changes At Short Tracks

2024 Cup Series Season

Now, keep in mind Iowa had fewer laps to create lead changes than all but one track on that list: Phoenix (312). And with enough cautions (eight) to keep the field honest, you had a nice mix of strategy but only a handful of those lead changes occurring during a green or caution-flag pit stop.

There’s also another Loop Data metric NASCAR likes to tout for good racing: green-flag passes on the track. It’s here where Iowa really stands out above the rest, especially considering how difficult it’s been to pass with the Next Gen short track package.

There you have it. Even compared to Bristol, which scored 87.3 percent in Jeff Gluck’s Good Race Poll, Iowa had more passes and more action if you extend out the race to match Thunder Valley’s 500 laps.

And the extra asterisk that can’t be ignored here is the fresh pavement laid down across several areas. Typically, that handicaps racing and forces drivers to deal with only one groove; instead, we saw three-abreast action at Iowa happening throughout the entirety of the 350-lap event.

Plus, the rumored tire disaster, with wear similar to what happened at Bristol earlier this year, never truly materialized. Half a dozen drivers experienced failures during the long green-flag run of the race, but it wasn’t highly abnormal compared to other places the Cup Series visits.

Looking ahead, who knows how the NASCAR schedule might change in all sorts of different ways for 2025. In the Midwest market, there’s rumors about Chicagoland Speedway making a long-awaited return or the Chicago Street Race being shifted off the schedule. There’s other travel options for NASCAR fans in that region, from Indianapolis Motor Speedway to even World Wide Technology Raceway or the Milwaukee Mile.

But the fans from Iowa alone are more than enough to sustain this track for years to come. The fact the racing might even get better after a year of learning tire management and the local amenities make the area an attractive draw for out-of-towners.

It feels like going forward, Iowa has earned its place. Everyone will just have to wait and see whether the powers that be at NASCAR agree; but, as the actual track owners, you would think they’d like their property used for Cup Series competition at least once a year.

Here’s some other trends and stats to know after a weekend of racing in the Hawkeye State.

201

The most laps led in any race during Ryan Blaney’s Cup career (323 starts). He shattered the previous high of 163 from a dominant Coca-Cola 600 performance at Charlotte Motor Speedway last season.

17.9

The average finish for Kyle Busch in the Cup Series through 17 starts. If that holds, it would be the worst average finish of the 39-year-old’s Cup career since his rookie season back in 2005 (21.0). Keep in mind Busch’s streak of 19 straight Cup seasons with a victory has yet to be extended (although he does have two wins in the Craftsman Truck Series).

3.8

Average finish for Chase Elliott on the four tracks less than a mile we’ve run on this season in Cup: Bristol, Richmond, Martinsville and Iowa. Elliott’s led laps in all four of those events, his strength part of the reason he took the point lead over Kyle Larson for the first time in 2024.

3

Top-15 finishes in the last five Cup races for Justin Haley with Rick Ware Racing (13th at Iowa). Keep in mind that in 624 career starts in the Cup Series, RWR has just 14 other top-15 results. All of them occurred on the pack racing tracks of Daytona, Atlanta and Talladega, while Haley’s have come at intermediates like Darlington, Gateway, and now the Iowa short track.

1

Toyota to finish in the top 10 at Iowa, tied for the fewest in any Cup race this season (Christopher Bell, fourth). The only other time it happened was at Talladega Superspeedway in April but, at least in that event, they emerged a winner with Tyler Reddick.

In the meantime, Ford has emerged to win three of the last five Cup events with their new chassis after going 0-for-12 to start the season.

Follow Tom Bowles on X @NASCARBowles