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Recently, there have been major movements within NASCAR to adjust the Sprint Cup schedule to bring races to new tracks, or give a second race to certain, favorite, tracks such as Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The calls for changes to the schedule have come from fans, drivers, and track owners and promoters, such as Bruton Smith, who owns Speedway Motorsports Inc. The most recent movement calls for NASCAR to add a race at Kentucky Speedway, a recent SMI purchase. Even though NASCAR feels that the current Sprint Cup schedule meets both the company's business requirements while also running races at tracks where fans get to see exciting racing, making drastic changes to the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule would greatly benefit NASCAR from both the business and fan standpoint.

There is never a shortage of fans and drivers that call for changes to the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule. The most common complaints are from fans who find races at the Auto Club Speedway of Southern California (formerly California Speedway), Texas Motor Speedway, and Pocono Raceway entirely too boring, without any real racing action. The drivers often complain about the facilities at some of the tracks on the schedule, such as the garages, the motor home lots, and track itself. For these reasons, both the drivers and fans would like schedule changes.

Track owners and promotors like Bruton Smith want to adjust the schedule so that their tracks get more races and, in turn, they would get a higher profit from Sprint Cup Series races. The track owners and promoters want to adjust the schedule so that the races have full grandstands, regardless of where they are being held. Like NASCAR, track owners and promoters want to race where it makes the most financial sense.

The best way to way to address the concerns of the drivers, fans, and track owners, is by spreading out the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule among many tracks. Only the most prestigious tracks, such as Daytona, Talladega, and Lowes Motor Speedway, should have multiple race dates on the Sprint Cup Schedule. This would leave thirty race dates open to spread among 30 different tracks. Furthermore, the NASCAR All Star race should be rotated among the tracks on the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule instead of hosting it at Lowes Motor Speedway each year.

Adjusting the schedule so that thirty three different tracks host NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races has many advantages.

First and foremost, it allows races to be held in locations that typically have not had the opportunity to host a Sprint Cup race because NASCAR felt the market was saturated in the area. In a time when track attendance is dwindling due to the poor economic conditions in the country, NASCAR would benefit by spreading the races out across many more tracks, allowing fans to spend less on traveling expenses. Fans would also be more inclined to go to race tracks that are closer to their homes.

One of the biggest fan complaint is that races at certain tracks is boring. One of the tracks drawing most of this criticism is the Auto Club Speedway of Southern California. Fans often wonder why NASCAR takes races to the track twice a year when the races are typically boring and the races are never sold out. NASCAR's argument is that the track in Fontana is in the key, Los Angeles, market. The best way to satisfy both is to move one of the races from the Auto Club Speedway to the Toyota Speedway at Irwindale (formerly Irwindale Speedway). This would allow NASCAR to keep two races in the Los Angeles market, while also providing fans with the exciting short track racing that is common in Irwindale.

Only allowing three tracks to host two races also allows NASCAR to add a road course race to the schedule. Road course racing provides some of the most exciting racing of the season, while also stirring the tempers of the drivers. Who can forget the incident at the 2007 Watkins Glen race between Kevin Harvick and Juan Pablo Montoya, or the incident between Robby Gordon and Marcus Ambrose in the Nationwide Series race in Montreal? Aside from the emotion, road course racing truly tests the talents of the drivers. There are many road course tracks that would be a perfect fit, such as Road America in Wisconsin.

One other possibility, though not very likely, would be adding a dirt track race to the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule. Racing on the dirt would allow NASCAR to truly claim that it has the best drivers in the world. This is not likely, though, because of the drastic changes necessary to allow the cars to safely run on a dirt track like Eldora Speedway.

There are many advantages to spreading out the NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule among many race tracks. Ultimately, it is unlikely that NASCAR make these changes, even though the changes would greatly benefit NASCAR, the track owners and operators, and most importantly, the fans. NASCAR has been seeing a decline in track attendance and ratings in recent years. Bringing NASCAR's highest series to new tracks would change that.

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