IndyCar: Five reasons destroying Walt Disney World Speedway was a mistake

Walt Disney World Speedway was recently destroyed after closing for good. Here are five IndyCar-related reasons why this was the wrong move.

Walt Disney World Speedway was a 3-turn, 1-mile tri-oval speedway that hosted IndyCar races for five seasons. It opened in November of 1995 and hosted those five IndyCar races from 1996 to 2000, with one race in each of those seasons. In fact, the track hosted the first ever Indy Racing League race in 1996 in a race won by Buzz Calkins.

The track also held one NASCAR Truck Series races in each of the 1997 and 1998 seasons. It was eventually closed after nearly 20 seasons of operation in August of 2015 before it was then completely destroyed.

In the 15 seasons from the track’s last IndyCar race to 2015 when it was eventually destroyed, the track really served no purpose aside of hosting the Richard Petty Driving Experience, the Indy Racing Experience and the Exotic Driving Experience. The track was joked to have been the “fastest ride in Disney World”, which was actually true if you choose to look at it that way.

While IndyCar had not raced at the track in over 15 years when it was finally destroyed and had no immediate interest in returning, it’s hard to keep from wondering how a return to the track would have gone down and what it would have meant to the series.

On that note, let’s have a look at five reasons why tearing down Walt Disney World Speedway was a mistake.