The Return of the Brickyard 400.
If parts of the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series campaign were broken up into cinematic feature films, that would easily be the title of the movie for the lead up to the July 21 race.
There just isn’t a more succinct way to describe this year’s revival of the legendary crown-jewel race.
The Brickyard 400 is truly an epic historical quest in the NASCAR universe that pits 40 drivers against each other for immortal glory.
It’s Indianapolis Motor Speedway, after all. History seeps out of every crack of concrete that holds the steel spectator stands and rises up through the seams in the asphalt from the bricks buried deep below. This is the ground that Ray Harroun, Wilbur Shaw, AJ Foyt and Jeff Gordon plowed.
This is not Las Vegas Motor Speedway or Michigan International Speedway. Watkins Glen International is cool and beautiful, but it doesn’t stir the emotions like Indy. Darlington Raceway is a time-honored tradition and Daytona International Speedway is stock car’s holy land, for sure.
But Indy is racing’s heaven. Winning there on the oval eternally ties you to the birthplace of motorsports’ soul.
NASCAR hadn’t disappeared from IMS prior to this year’s Brickyard 400. For three years, the stock car elite ran the road course, and the first race had action until the checkered flag.
But something seemed amiss. Drivers were detached from the pantheon that was reached by Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart, Dale Jarrett and many others that won on the oval. Sure, AJ Allmendinger made it known that a win at IMS was legitimate, but it lacked that epic feeling, and felt replaced with just-another-event atmosphere.
The Brickyard 400 jewel embedded in the crown next to the glistening gems for the Daytona 500, Coca Cola 600 and Southern 500 had lost its shine, replaced with a Ring Pop candy piece.
The return of the Brickyard 400 in 2024 was more than just a race — it was a rekindling (and reminder) of the stock car tradition and nostalgia at the historic 2.5-mile oval. It surprisingly felt like a homecoming for NASCAR, even considering the Indianapolis 500 prominence at the facility. While the on-track action may not have been dramatically different from previous years — I thought it was still good — the significance of returning to the grand stage that the oval provides overshadowed the competition itself, creating a moment that felt restorative mixed with a pinch…
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