Rockingham interested in NASCAR Cup return after successful revival event

Rockingham Speedway has expressed interest in hosting a round of the NASCAR Cup Series after a successful revival event last weekend.

The North Carolina-based circuit staged standalone Xfinity and Truck races in front of a sold-out crowd, as tens of thousands of fans clocked to the 0.94-mile oval.

Rockingham was a regular fixture on the Cup Series schedule between 1966-2004, but had largely been desolated since it was stripped from the calendar two decades ago.

It hosted standalone Truck races in 2012 and 2013, but the Easter Weekend of 2025 marked the first time the second-tier Xfinity Series returned to the track as part of a bigger revival event.

The reception to the races was largely positive, with teams and drivers praising the renovated facilities.

“I’m pretty hands on, so I talked to them from Thursday night, when we got here, to all day today,” promoter Bob Sargent told The Charlotte Observer.

“Talked to a lot of different people at NASCAR, whether they were here or weren’t here. [NASCAR board member] Mike Helton was here yesterday, and I talked to people on the phone today. And the teams that were here, we talked to them a lot.

“Older, veteran drivers that I got relationships with, they were texting me, calling me. And then again, the sponsors who were here, I talked with them all day long. The fans. The officials. My workers. A lot of positives from everybody.”

With the Xfinity and Truck races running smoothly over the weekend, there has naturally been speculation about Rockingham also being added to the Cup Series schedule in the coming years.

Asked if he thought last weekend proved that Rockingham deserved to be added to the Cup Series calendar, Sargent said the circuit is already on NASCAR’s radar.

“Yes, absolutely, with the caveat that NASCAR is a big, worldwide entity, and when you look at dates, there are only so many.

“There are only so many geographic regions and things like that. So there are many factors that go into when dates get put where. So it’s not a magic wand.

“But I feel comfortable, and am not saying anything out of line that, yes, we did everything we needed to do.”

“It’s a process. But we are on the radar. We are in that process.”

For most of its history, Rockingham held two NASCAR Cup Series races every season, with the champion often getting decided in the second of the two events.

The circuit went through various ownership changes over the decades, with Roger Penske and Bruton Smith even engaging in a bitter battle for control of the track at one point in the 1990s.

Rockingham was taken over by a group of investors led by businessman Dan Lovenheim in 2018.