IndyCar: 3 tracks where Jimmie Johnson could make his debut
By Asher Fair
Jimmie Johnson IndyCar debut: Barber Motorsports Park
Jimmie Johnson had stated that the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season may not end up being his last, depending on how many races are able to be contested given the current situation with the coronavirus pandemic, but he later confirmed that it still would be.
With that in mind, Barber Motorsports Park would provide the perfect opportunity for him to get behind the wheel of a real IndyCar and compete next year.
The 17-turn, 2.38-mile (3.83-kilometer) natural terrain road course in Birmingham, Alabama is where he had planned to make his testing debut to begin with, and the track is set to return to the schedule in the 2021 season despite the fact that the race there was canceled this year.
For the 2020 season, and in many past seasons, the race at Barber Motorsports Park was the first road course race on the schedule, and there is no reason to believe that this will change in 2021, despite its 2020 cancellation.
With Johnson no longer slated to be tied down to a full-time Cup Series schedule next spring, this early opportunity could prove to be the best in terms of his IndyCar debut.
On top of that, it is one of the two tracks at which he has competed against the majority of the IndyCar field already, albeit in iRacing. The other one is no longer on the IndyCar schedule and hasn’t been since the 2017 season, so it doesn’t appear to be an option.