There is only one thing the NASCAR drivers can’t seem to sit well with: road courses, and specifically the new ones. As the Cup Series moves this year to a one-of-a-kind race at San Diego, on the Naval Base Coronado, Joe Gibbs Racing’s #19 driver warns the field about the lack of visibility, and hopes for the Navy to be present, as he brings into discussion a new threat about the track.

“You’ll see a lot of probably guys like sticking their nose in, and because guys are going to open up corners. And there’s really no spotters for a large majority of the racetrack. So, I mean, yeah, I definitely could see there being carnage,” Chase Briscoe told the media (via Frontstretch) at Michigan. 

At a standard oval, a single spotter placed high in the grandstand can track their driver across the entire circuit. Road courses break that model entirely, as on a snaking circuit, teams typically need at least three spotter positions to cover the full layout, often recruiting part-timers to fill gaps.

As Nick Payne explained to ESPN on how the role shifts across formats: “There are kind of three levels [to spotting]. On a road course, you’re helping the driver understand scenarios and how to manage the race. On ovals, you’re both managing and helping them drive. Superspeedways are the ultra-extreme. You’re basically helping them steer the car.”

In Chicago, which NASCAR ran from 2023 to 2025 before moving to Coronado, spotters found themselves atop a building home to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, regarded as one of the United States’ “Big Five” orchestras, simply to gain line of sight on a usable portion of the track.

As Hayden Reeves, primary spotter for Legacy Motor Club driver Erik Jones, described the Symphony Center position: “You are higher up, so you can see more, even though some of the braking zone into (Turn) 11 is blocked by the tree, you can at least see when somebody’s setting it up and can give (a driver) a heads-up. From here, you can pick them up a little sooner.”

The Qualcomm Circuit makes all of that more complicated. The course is surrounded by base buildings, hangars, and infrastructure for most of its length, an environment arguably more visually obstructed than any circuit currently on the schedule.

Moreover, no team has run this circuit in any format. There is no prior year’s data on where to station a spotter for the section that runs along San Diego Bay, no precedent for visibility lines around the base buildings, and no equivalent circuit from which to draw meaningful comparisons. The teams are, in the most literal sense, figuring it out from scratch with thirty-six Cup cars on the grid.

And the Mexico City race at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in July 2025 provided one of the freshest data points on exactly the kind of problem Briscoe is flagging. At NASCAR’s first visit to that permanent 2.49-mile, 15-turn circuit in nearly 20 years, the initial designated spotter locations proved immediately inadequate – stands positioned too low to provide clear visibility into Turn 1, one of the track’s critical braking zones. After consultation with NASCAR, spotters were allowed to relocate, but several still reported insufficient sightlines by race day.

That said, when drivers can’t be warned of what’s happening ahead because their spotter physically can’t see it, the instinct is to take a chance, stick the nose in, assume the corner opens up, and trust the gap is still there. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn’t. For instance, at COTA in 2023, a multi-car pileup into the bus stop chicane on the opening lap was traced in part to drivers committing to corners without full situational awareness.

However, there is another issue that Briscoe warns NASCAR of.

“I guess if you’re going to go in the bay, I would assume having the Navy there with scuba divers would probably be the best place to ever do it. Not that I want to do that, but yeah, if you’re going to go in the water somewhere in a race car, I would say that is the place to do it,” he added.

It’s not a surprise that there is water near the naval base, and while a part of the circuit goes through the base, some of the sections are on the outskirts, and one section, particularly between turns 2 and 5, runs right alongside the bay, and is also a straight.

NASCAR has not always been too far from airborne crashes, and if one were to happen here, it is quite natural that the drivers would be worried about finding the bay, connected directly to the Pacific Ocean. However, the likelihood of this happening is less. This straight begins with two narrow corners, so the cars will already be slow, and it is simply not long enough for drivers to reach top speeds. Still, it is only safe for Chase Briscoe to make a point.

How does the schedule for NASCAR’s Naval Base Coronado race look?

Quite a few activities lie ahead of NASCAR’s weekend at the Naval Base Coronado. This is set to be a packed weekend of racing, as all three national–level series will be competing throughout the weekend. In fact, the Truck Series is set to have two separate practice sessions. Here is how the entire weekend’s schedule looks (local time zone): 

Friday, June 19th

Truck Series:

• 09:00 AM: 1st Practice session
• 10:00 AM: 2nd Practice session
• 11:00 AM: Qualifying
• 04:00 PM: Race

O’Reilly Auto Parts Series:

• 12:30 PM: Practice session

Cup Series:

• 02:00 PM: Practice Session

Saturday, June 20th

O’Reilly Auto Parts Series

• 10:00 AM: Qualifying
• 02:00 PM: Race (United Rentals Driven to Serve 250)

Cup Series:

• 11:30 AM: Qualifying

Sunday, June 21st

Cup Series:

• 01:00 PM: Race (Anduril 250) [Stages: 20/40/75]