It seems a bit unfair to us that the NASCAR Trucks will get to visit more of Naval Air Station North Island than the Stadium Super Trucks, but it can’t be helped.

Last month, NASCAR unveiled the layout for the inaugural San Diego race weekend on June 19–21, 2026. Speculation was rampant over the summer as to where it’d specifically take place, like downtown San Diego or possibly somewhere outside the city or its final location on the Coronado Naval Base.

Coronado seemed to draw a lot of skepticism online because the thought of racing on an active military installation seemed wholly impractical, which is a fair assumption but also ironic since A) downtown San Diego is too tight for a race, and B) the island had already hosted the Coronado Speed Festival for two decades.

However, NASCAR is getting a lot more leeway in using the base than the San Diego Fleet Week Foundation ever did for the CSF.

The NASCAR course runs counter-clockwise across 3.4 miles, the longest track on the schedule, and 16 turns. It begins on the Ellyson Start/Finish Line, named after Commander Theodore G. Ellyson. A submariner during the First World War, he was the first Navy officer to serve as an aviator before and after the war. North Island trained Ellyson and his fellow aviators well before it was commissioned as a Naval Air Station in 1917.

From there, the course turns right and goes by the NAVFAC (Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command) building before a pair of 90-degree left turns. Along the way, cars will go by the Center for Naval Aviation Technical Training Unit and Andrew Mills Hall where enlisted sailors live. The second 90° left brings drivers out to the San Diego Bay.

Two long straightaways follow with a sweeping lefthand Turn 5 nicknamed “Carrier Corner” since ships are typically ported in the Bay. Also along this portion of the track is the Southwest Regional Apprentice Program’s campus. After the SWRAP parking lot comes the “Coronado Chicane” to bring cars closer to the water and past the helicopter airfield and hangars.

Another pair of chicanes then lead into a wide Turn 12 and down “Runway Road”, named such because it comes close to the north end of Runway 36. A final chicane leads to a last straight into Turn 16 and back to Ellyson.

The tarmac surrounding Fleet Readiness Center Southwest will serve as the fan zone and garage.

“Anticipation for this event is already high, and we know this course layout will raise that level of excitement even higher,” said NASCAR San Diego president Amy Lupo. “We can’t wait to see how the best drivers in the world meet this challenge, while celebrating America’s Navy.”

Needless to say, it’s certainly a lot of ground being covered. By comparison, the Coronado Speed Festival exclusively took place on a modified 1.7-mile track that ran along the southern tip of Runway 36 and the surrounding entryways.

When the Stadium Super Trucks were at the CSF in 2014, they also added ramps along the final two straights. Given how wide the runway is, they simply split that into a pair of straightaways with a chicane connecting them.

Runways 18/36 and the accompanying facilities needed repairs that prevented the Speed Festival from taking place in 2017. Financial issues ultimately killed the event off.

The Truck Series race will be exclusive to sailors while the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series (that’ll take some getting used to) and Cup Series can have civilians in attendance. The weekend is meant to celebrate the Navy’s 250th birthday, similar to how the Xfinity Series had the Marine Corps 250 at Martinsville in March for that branch’s semiquincentennial that took place on Monday.

Sheldon Creed will have the benefit of racing both the Runway 36 and full North Island tracks. He finished second in the lone SST race at Coronado as a 16-year-old, and will run the NOAPS race 12 years later.

Neither NASCAR nor the Coronado Speed Festival were the first times a street race was held on a military base in the San Diego area. In the 1950s, the deactivated WWII-era Camp Callan in La Jolla had a 2.7-mile track for the Torrey Pines Road Races. Air bases were also all the rage for sports car racing during this time on Gen. Curtis LeMay’s encouragement.

Featured image credit: NASCAR San Diego