San Diego has long been the epicenter of high-profile partnerships between sports, entertainment, and the military — and this weekend's NASCAR race at Naval Air Station Coronado may be the biggest yet.
Sunday's Anduril 250 Race the Base will be staged on a 3.4-mile track weaving past aircraft carriers and across the flight line of North Island. Construction on the track is nearly complete, with first practice runs scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Friday.
The base at North Island is no stranger to major sporting events. In 2022, Gonzaga defeated Michigan State in college basketball's Armed Forces Classic on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, docked in San Diego Bay. That game came a decade after San Diego State and Syracuse wore special camouflage uniforms in the Challenge on the Midway — itself inspired by the original Carrier Classic between North Carolina and Michigan State aboard the USS Carl Vinson in 2011.
One of the key challenges for the Navy this week has been maintaining full operational readiness while accommodating the massive influx of cars, pit crews, drivers, fans, and three weeks of construction leading up to the race.
"It's been some creative work to go through and figure how to minimize those impacts and mitigate, but the top goal has always been to maintain that operational readiness the whole time," Naval Base Coronado Commanding Officer Captain Loren "Wookie" Jacobi told ABC 10News this week.
San Diego's success in hosting landmark military-sports events has helped inspire similar events across the country. A Major League Baseball game between the Miami Marlins and Atlanta Braves was held 10 years ago at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Just this past weekend, the first-ever major sporting event at the White House took place, as UFC's Freedom 250 took over the South Lawn in a mixed martial arts celebration of America's 250th birthday.
None of those events, however, match the scale of this weekend's NASCAR race at Naval Air Station Coronado.
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