Iowa Speedway 2025 NASCAR Track Profile

[Editor’s note: The following article is from Athlon Sports’ 2025 Racing Annual magazine. Order your copy online today, or buy one at retail racks and newsstands nationwide.]

In 2024, the NASCAR Cup Series raced at Iowa Speedway in Newton, Iowa, for the first time. The 7/8th-mile short track has been hosting races for a variety of series since 2006, including the NASCAR Xfinity and Craftsman Truck tours. Designed by NASCAR Hall of Famer Rusty Wallace, the track was built similarly to Richmond Raceway. But with new patches of pavement in the turns, the slightly-larger oval has more grip and more lanes to utilize.

NASCAR bought the track from Wallace years ago, removing the Xfinity race after 2019 only to add the Cup (and Xfinity) Series five years later, a surprising about-face which revitalized the track. Ryan Blaney dominated to win the inaugural Cup event, leading 201 of 350 laps. Yet, despite an 84-lap green-flag run to end the race, Blaney only beat second-place William Byron by 0.716 seconds. Blaney had previously won at Iowa in both Xfinity and Trucks so, needless to say, he has quite a bit of experience here.

In fact, four of the top-5 finishers in 2024 had previous wins in Iowa Xfinity races: Blaney, Byron, Christopher Bell, and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Bell even won two consecutive Iowa NXS races, while Stenhouse set the standard with three straight triumphs.

The outlier was Chase Elliott in third, but he’s no Iowa slouch. Elliott never finished outside of the top 10 in four Xfinity starts, including a runner-up showing after leading 114 laps.

Despite having possibly the best car, Kyle Larson finished 34th at Iowa in 2024. He finished second in Stage 1 and won Stage 2, but pitted from the lead, only to get caught up in a wreck coming back through the field. Larson will want redemption in corn country in 2025.

Iowa Speedway track info

Site: Newton, Iowa

Laps: 0.875-mile D-shaped oval

Banking/Turns: Variable (12-14 degrees)

Banking/Frontstretch: 10 degrees

Banking/Backstretch: 4 degrees

2025 Date: Aug. 3

Distance: 350 laps, 306.25 miles

2024 winner

Ryan Blaney

Scouting report

One of last season’s biggest surprises was how competitive the racing at the inaugural Iowa Speedway event turned out. It’s not that there was a disdain for the venue, rather, skepticism in the decision to only partially repave portions of the bottom groove. In a way, it made the racing more compelling because each restart was a dogfight to get to the bottom or to force drivers up out of the grip on long green-flag runs. Everyone expects more of the same this summer.