‘Home Run’ at Bristol Motor Speedway

Article posted by Coliseum, August 15^th, 2024

Image: MLB and NASCAR

Bristol Motor Speedway will open its doors to Major League Baseball (MLB) when it hosts a regular-season ballgame between the Atlanta Braves and Cincinnati Reds in August 2025.

NASCAR said the “MLB Speedway Classic” will pull in the crowds on August 2 next year when the baseball and racing worlds come together in a unique fashion.

The 146,000-capacity Bristol Motor Speedway, formerly known as Bristol International Raceway and Bristol Raceway, is a NASCAR short track venue located in Bristol, Tennessee (US). Constructed in 1960, it held its first NASCAR race on July 30th, 1961.

MLB Vice President of Global Events Jeremiah Yolkut said MLB will work with BaAM Productions, BrightView and Populous, as it has in past builds, to create the layout of the playing field for the event.

Yolkut has led numerous global projects in his time with MLB, including events at the historic Rickwood Field in Alabama and the MLB London Series at London Stadium in England.

With a keen eye for big events, Yolkut sought a big venue that brought its own history and chose Bristol for the occasion.

He said, “It all starts with an idea. And for many years, a lot of folks within our organization and some of our partner organizations brought up the concept of playing at a large-scale sporting venue.

“And there’s not a lot of places that can host Major League Baseball. Our diamond obviously is unique — much different than some of the other sports. And so you really have to be strategic about what places you look at.

“But Bristol kept coming up as a possibility. And a few years ago, we came down here to take a look at it. You walk into the venue, and right away, you know you’re in a different kind of place, something incredibly special. Not only is it big on the outside, but the energy that’s on the inside, even when it’s empty, is different than any of the places that we’ve recently been, and that’s something you’re looking to make true.”

Murray Cook, leading BrightView’s field design and construction, acknowledged the challenges of fitting an MLB diamond within the confines of the Bristol footprint, noting a portion of the Goodyear Building inside Turns 1 and 2 will need to be removed in addition to several pit walls.

He added the build is expected to take 30 days, with an anticipated start on July 1, 2025.

He said, “We’ve got a good design laid out as far as the actual dimensions of the park. We’ve got 330 (feet) down the lines and 400 to center. We’ve got 375 to the right field alley, which is going to require part of the building out there to be removed, and we’re 384 (feet) to the left field alley. So we’ve got good dimensions all the way around, very respectable to any major-league park in the US.”

Jerry Caldwell, President and General Manager of Bristol Motor Speedway, said, “I think it’s an amazing opportunity — and it’s already begun — to see NASCAR and MLB pull together.

“I think this is a great platform for that. I think our fan bases fit naturally together, but I think we can do a lot of fun things to expose folks to both sides of that.”

Yolkut said MLB and the team would be working to identify any issues over the coming year, although a lot of planning had already been done.

He added, “I think that, from a construction standpoint and planning, you know, again, there’s a lot of leveling needs to be done as you mentioned, and our goal there is to level that up with gravel like they typically would under the baseball fields and soccer fields that they use synthetic turf on.

“And obviously that’s also creating a large drainage issue with the actual infield pit area, so we’re putting in a lot of drainage. We’re in the engineering process to get that buttoned up. But again, we’re on a good path and have got some good local partners here to work with.”

The “World’s Fastest Half-Mile,” as the track is known, housed the 2016 “Battle at Bristol,” a regular-season college football contest between the University of Tennessee and Virginia Tech, a game that drew an NCAA football record crowd of 156,990 people to the “Last Great Colosseum.”

The track additionally hosted an NCAA FCS football game between East Tennessee State and Western Carolina one week after the “Battle of Bristol,” while the National Football League played an exhibition football game at Bristol between Philadelphia and Washington in 1961.

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