Boles hopes Brickyard 400 will see an uptick, but will it?

You can shoot a cannon in those grandstands and not hit anyone

IMS President Doug Boles has been faced with plummeting Brickyard 400 since 2008. This year with the date change to September, and hopefully cooler temperatures, he hopes to change that.

“We’re really optimistic," he told IndyStar. “I feel pretty confident in saying we’ll have more people in the venue here on Sunday than we did last year. The question is how much more. But frankly, this is the first time since 2008 – with the exception of the year Jeff Gordon retired (2016) — that we’ve been able to turn the attendance around."

Boles wasn’t ready to divulge specific numbers Tuesday, but for perspective, IndyStar estimated there were 35,000 people at last year’s Brickyard – which was the lowest estimated attendance in the race’s now 25-year history.

But was the move to September a smart move?

The Brickyard 400 — which is now called the Big Machine Vodka at the Brickyard — will be run for the 25th time Sunday, and it is breathtaking to see how interest in the race has declined. Last year’s race, held July 23, drew an estimated 35,000 people.

At first, the move to September appeared to be logical. But this might have been NASCAR’s most puzzling decision ever.

This also happens to be the opening Sunday of the NFL season, which will surely hamper the race’s television ratings. But hang on. No more than six miles from the speedway, the Indianapolis Colts will open the season at home against Cincinnati an hour before the race.

The Brickyard 400 has lost its appeal not just because fans don’t like roasting in the stands, but because the historic racetrack has proven time and again to be too flat for stock cars. Passing is difficult, and cars are just too spread out on the 2½-mile track.

The Brickyard 400 remains on the schedule because it is on the most famous track in auto racing, and Hoosiers love racing. Jeff Gordon, who moved to nearby Pittsboro, Ind., from California when he was 16 to become a racer, won the first Brickyard, and four more later.

But Gordon is long gone, the Brickyard 400 is little more than a parade — and to top it all, the Colts, with new coach Frank Reich, will be playing at home Sunday afternoon. The speedway will look depressingly empty, especially compared with 67,000 at Lucas Oil Stadium.

Boles and the Speedway would lose their shirt on the NASCAR race if not for the lucrative NASCAR TV money

A 24-race NASCAR Cup season could have ended Labor Day Weekend with the Southern 500, a stock-car tradition. The stands for that race this year were filled, and Brad Keselowski won an entertaining race. The Brickyard 400 will look like a stale afterthought.

This race won’t offer much drama. Fourteen of the 16 playoff berths have been clinched, and the drivers holding onto the last two spots, Jimmie Johnson and Alex Bowman, will clinch spots if they, or any of the 14 drivers with a playoff spot, win the Brickyard 400.

The race won’t even be telecast on NBC, as it was last year, but on the NBC Sports Network. Last year’s race drew a 3.4 rating and 5.6 million viewers, improvements of 10 and eight percent respectively over 2016, but the race was not colliding with the NFL, either.

Not every NASCAR fan likes the NFL. But the Brickyard 400 is going up against portions of 12 NFL games at the same time. It is possible that the race could draw less than the low 1.4 rating and 2.33 million viewers for the NBCSN telecast of the Aug. 18 Cup race at Bristol, Tenn.

(Season-low numbers are the 1.2 rating and 2.04 million viewers for a race in May at Kansas on Fox Sports One cable.)

The first Brickyard 400 in 1994 was the result of a novel idea that was well marketed, and the race did OK until the economic downturn in 2008. By 2010, estimated attendance was one-third what it was 10 years earlier. Last year, it was one-third of what it was in 2010.

A week after a high point that should have ended the Cup season, NASCAR could hit a low point Sunday with a not-very-interesting race that has gone way past its expiration date — and will be going up this time against the NFL, which does not lose many TV battles.

NASCAR is not dying, and it would survive the loss of a race at a famous track. There are other tracks that could do more with a date. It makes no sense to continue to collide with the NFL on opening weekend, but that can be handled by trimming the schedule, as it should be.

Cool temperatures are in the forecast for Sunday in Indianapolis, but so is rain. The Colts game will go on, because they play inside. Monday, the rain date, is a work and school day in Indiana. NASCAR can’t buy many breaks, but this wound was self-inflicted. Dave Caldwell/Forbes