2025 Cup Series Event in Mexico City

On Tuesday, NASCAR officials revealed that the Cup Series will race in Mexico next season, marking the first international points event in the division’s modern history on the 2025 schedule.

This historic race is set for Sunday, June 15, at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City, the nation’s capital. A companion event for the NASCAR Xfinity Series is planned for the preceding day. The Cup Series race will be broadcast live on Prime Video, while Saturday’s Xfinity Series race will air live on The CW.

“This has been on our radar for a long time,” said Ben Kennedy, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief venue & racing innovation officer. “We’ve been talking about the continued iteration of our schedule, right? You can go back a few years, went to new markets like Nashville and Austin, Texas. We went to the Coliseum for the Clash. … We went to our first street race in downtown Chicago, and this is going to be another first for us in a lot of ways. This is going to be certainly a monumental event for us, the first time we’re going south of the border.”

While a points-paying Cup Series event in Mexico is a first, NASCAR has had a presence in the country for years. The Hermanos Rodríguez circuit hosted four Xfinity Series races from 2005 to 2008, with current Cup Series stars Martin Truex Jr., Denny Hamlin, and Kyle Busch among the winners.

NASCAR has also sanctioned the NASCAR México Series since its inception in 2004, and the Hermanos Rodríguez course will be the site of this year’s season finale on November 3. Mexican-born Cup Series driver Daniel Suárez, who won the season opener at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in February, is one of the notable drivers to emerge from this series.

“This, for me, is like a dream,” Suárez said during Tuesday’s announcement. “This is really a dream come true. Exactly 10 years ago, I was here racing NASCAR Mexico in 2014, and I won a race here before leaving NASCAR México and moving full-time to the NASCAR Xfinity Series in 2015, and I knew that some, some years before my time, the NASCAR Xfinity Series had the opportunity to come to Mexico for a few years and I remember thinking what a dream it would be for me to race the NASCAR Cup Series one day in my country. I remember thinking that, and fast forward now nine years later, and here we are in Mexico City.”

Kennedy mentioned that the partnership with Mexico City is a multiyear deal, representing the latest innovative step by NASCAR’s schedule makers. The Cup Series did hold two races in Canada in its early years — a 1952 event won by Buddy Shuman at Stamford Park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, and a 1958 race at the Canadian Exposition Stadium in Toronto, where Lee Petty won and his son, Richard, made his first of a record 1,184 Cup starts. Additionally, the series held exhibition races in Japan from 1996 to 1998.

Returning the sport’s top division to the global stage has been a long-standing priority. “It’s huge,” Kennedy said. “When we talk as a leadership team about where we feel like our biggest growth opportunities as a sport is, international is always one of the first things that comes up. … We brought the Craftsman Truck Series to Canada for a number of years, we’ve had the Xfinity Series in Mexico. This is a monumental moment for our sport in the sense that this is our first step of really taking the Cup Series internationally, and I think it could set us up for the future in potential new markets. I think we’ve been honest about our interest in taking our Cup Series abroad, whether that’s north of the border or south of the border, and then as we talk about some of our other races, there are opportunities for us to take the Cup Series even further than that.”

“So, it’s going to be a big project for us. There’s a lot of questions that we have. I’m sure that the industry will have some questions as well, but excited to take this on, and to go to one of the biggest markets — not just in the country, but in the world — is going to be huge for our sport.”

The Mexico City track, which has both road course and oval configurations, has hosted various series since its construction in 1959. Named in honor of racing brothers Ricardo and Pedro Rodríguez shortly after it opened, the circuit was remodeled in 2015 and has since hosted eight Formula 1 grands prix.

NASCAR used a 2.518-mile layout during the Xfinity Series races from 2005 to 2008, short of the full 2.674-mile, 17-turn course. Kennedy said the race lengths for both the Cup and Xfinity Series events are still under development.

NASCAR will collaborate with OCESA, the promoter of the Mexico City Grand Prix for Formula 1 and organizer of other large-scale entertainment events in the country.

“At OCESA, we are dedicated to entertaining people, and this has positioned us as the most powerful live events platform in Mexico and Latin America, as well as one of the most important globally,” said Alejandro Soberón, Founder and CEO of OCESA. “The arrival of the NASCAR Cup Series to our country reflects the significant growth that motorsports has experienced in Mexico, an achievement in which Escudería Telmex has played a major role by promoting the NASCAR Mexico Series and supporting drivers like Daniel Suárez.”

Kennedy also confirmed that Richmond Raceway would be reduced from two NASCAR race weekends to one in 2025 to accommodate the Mexico City event.

“We’re still committed to Richmond,” Kennedy said. “It’s an important track, an important market certainly, as we think about where our NASCAR fans are today. We’ve seen some exciting story lines certainly coming out of that track over the past few years and excited to continue to be there next year, put on a great event for our fans, and put a lot of that energy and resources into that event.”

Regarding the excitement surrounding Tuesday’s announcement, Kennedy praised the positive reception from the national media and dignitaries. The full 2025 NASCAR calendar has only been partially revealed, but the sport has added new venues to its schedule for five consecutive years.

Now, Kennedy says, the planning for logistics, transportation, and set-up begins, with on-the-ground support for an event less than a year away.

“I’m certain that this is also just the start of it,” Kennedy said. “We have 10 months of planning ahead of us and a lot of other opportunities to have announcements leading into this event. So, you know, excited to continue to drive that energy to June of next year.”