Why Kansas is no ordinary intermediate track

In the fall of 2001, under a sunny Midwestern sky, a new racetrack hosted its first NASCAR Cup Series race.

Kansas Speedway is a 1.5-mile paved tri-oval racetrack sitting on over 1,200 acres just west of downtown Kansas City (Missouri) off the 70 and 435 interstates. It is a classic cookie-cutter intermediate, and if its aerial shot were overlaid with Las Vegas Motor Speedway or the now-defunct Chicagoland Speedway (the track names and logos absent), it would probably take a minute to tell them apart.

In that regard, there is nothing special about Kansas. It has variable banking through the tri-oval and corners, and the backstretch seems almost flat. It’s a cliché, but if you’ve seen one intermediate, you’ve seen them all.

Kansas Speedway deserves to be showered with sunflowers, however. Somewhere along the way in the last 23 years, Kansas has separated itself from its sister tracks and it’s become a must-watch event as a bit of a wild card in the postseason.

As the surface continues to age, the racing has become some of the best in the series. It can be a slick track, it’s fast, and drivers have spoken fondly of it more and more. It’s become a favorite because of the options drivers have with multiple lanes and ways to be successful, and with speed found by running around the wall, it leaves no margin for error.

“I love this race track,” Christopher Bell said after winning the pole last weekend. “I love qualifying here too. It’s so much fun to be able to drive as hard as you can, put it right up against the wall and see what she’s got.”