IndyCar CEO has promised international races before — but is it different this time?

With the announcement that NASCAR had secured a Cup Series race in Mexico City, all eyes in the American motorsport world turned to IndyCar. With the largest — and most convenient — international market now dominated by NASCAR, what should IndyCar do to respond?

According to CEO Mark Miles, the answer is in a different international event — perhaps even a fully international off-season championship. But is this promise of an international race different than any others?

Mark Miles: IndyCar needs an international off-season championship

As reported by IndyStar , Mark Miles took to the press conference stage ahead of IndyCar’s doubleheader event at Milwaukee to share his ideas about what the sport should become in the future.

Primarily, Miles has expressed interest in developing an off-season race series that would feature three or four international races to bridge the gap between IndyCar’s September finale and its March return.

That is, in large part, because Miles wants to avoid the mid-season expenditure that would accompany a mid-season race abroad.“Are we going to Scandinavia in June, or April? We could, right? We could fly to Australia in the middle of the championship,” Miles said to IndyStar, his voice rife with sarcasm.

“We’re not going to do it. We’re not going to do it.

“What we are going to try and do is have some international events that we can tie together in the offseason.”

He further noted that the drivers pushing for these international races don’t seem to understand the economics and logistics of hosting an international event. Speaking of Brazil, Miles stated that it would cost “$8 million” to host a race — but that finding the funding would be difficult.

Later in the weekend, Miles spoke again with IndyStar to say, We don’t want to be F1, where the whole thing is bopping around the world.

“There’s lots of places that with the economics we probably could go race, but I don’t love the idea that we’d have a non-points race during the championship and take two or three weeks and create a hole.

“We don’t want to be popping around to wherever anyone throws us money. We want to have meaningful events that stand for something and can promote the brand.”

That meaning, though, could potentially be found in developing that aforementioned off-season series.

“Chip [Ganassi] has a very strong point-of-view, and I think he’s winning me over,” Miles told IndyStar .

“I’ve said, ‘You’ve got to start with just one. I think I can get one,’ and he says, ‘No, then everyone thinks you’re just going and chasing the money. You’ve got to have ‘it.’”

An off-season championship would reduce the logistical burdens on IndyCar as a whole while also preventing any mid-season calendar gaps as the series travels to a new country. And with Miles noting that this championship would be slated for 2026, it would provide plenty of time for IndyCar to organize something impressive.

The only problem is that this isn’t the first time Miles has promised to explore an international race.

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Mark Miles took over as IndyCar’s CEO in 2012. The following year, in 2013, Miles spoke to USA Today Sports about perhaps adding international events to the IndyCar calendar before or after its North American season.

“The strategic move here is to condense the schedule,” Miles told USA Today Sports. “The point is to make the season more compact, which opens it up to international events before and after the North American part of the schedule.”

He pinpointed Brazil as a particular international venue of interest, but that he hoped for three events. The prospective debut of those international events was said to be 2015. It didn’t happen.

In a 2015 teleconference, Miles again expressed his interest in adding an international race or two, albeit “in a subsequent year.” Speaking to Motorsport.com , he stated that he felt that a race in Mexico City was completely possible in 2017.

In 2016, in a Q&A with Mark Miles again admitted to RACER that “I do think there are [international] prospects, and I’m hopeful that before February of 2018 we’ll be able to prove that.”

In 2018, again speaking to IndyStar , Miles stated that he had had serious conversations with the Australian government, and that they’d begun to tackle the logistics of hosting an event on the Gold Coast. According to reporter, Jim Ayello, Miles had stated that the Australian race may arrive in 2020 — but if that was too soon, 2021.

In 2019, in speaking with IndyStar about the possibility of a NASCAR/IndyCar doubleheader, Miles again reiterated his interest in adding international races.

When Roger Penske bought IndyCar later that year, Miles told Forbes, “We’ve talked for a while now about exploring the possibility of a very limited number of international races” but that he didn’t want to “willy-nilly” it.

The COVID-19 pandemic quashed IndyCar’s international hopes in 2020, and in 2021, Miles told Autosport that “I think it’s much less likely that we do a flyaway international race in the short term.” But a race in Mexico? Miles admitted that it was still a “possibility.”

And in 2023, Mark Miles told RACER that international events were possible in 2024 — perhaps to Mexico or Argentina.

Now, as the 2024 IndyCar season winds down, Miles is again bringing up the idea of a multi-race mini-championship during IndyCar’s offseason, with the promise that it will debut in 2026.

Two years away — just as Miles has promised time and time again.

Perhaps things are different this time around. NASCAR has shown that a seemingly national series can expand beyond America’s borders, and drivers like Pato O’Ward have become increasingly critical of IndyCar’s stagnation. Chip Ganassi seems to be somehow involved in this international push, while Miles has also spoken out about returning to “old” IndyCar venues like Richmond or Watkins Glen.

“We’re not going back to places like Richmond,” Miles told IndyStar . “You’ve got to get your head out of the ‘old’ us. I don’t want to go to places that we’ve been, and I think I’m winning.

“We recently had a conversation where somebody said, ‘They want us back at Watkins Glen.’ And instantly, ‘Oh yeah, that’s great!’ No f-cking way.

“We’ve got to quit being what we’ve been. We have to show some innovation.”

But will that innovation extend to an international calendar? We’ll find out in two years.

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