Michigan International Speedway is a 2.000-mile D-shaped superspeedway in the Irish Hills region of Michigan, originally built in 1968 with backing from Windsor Raceway owner Lawrence LoPatin. After financial difficulties forced the facility into receivership, motorsport businessman Roger Penske purchased it in 1973 and stabilised its operations. The track ran USAC double-headers through the 1970s before CART inherited the sanctioning rights in 1979.
In 1981, the existing summer race was extended from 250 miles to 500, inaugurating the Michigan 500 as a standalone prestige event. Pancho Carter won the inaugural edition. The race formed one leg of what was informally considered open-wheel racing's 500-mile triple crown, alongside Indianapolis and Pocono.
Marlboro's title sponsorship from 1987 through 1996 gave the Michigan race a distinctive identity within the CART calendar. The sponsorship underscored the race's prestige and its place among the season's premier rounds. During this era, Michigan consistently produced some of the fastest racing in the world.
The 1990 race — won by Al Unser Jr. at an average speed of 189.727 mph — was the fastest 500-mile race in history at the time of its running, a record that stood until 2002. The track's high-banked, wide surface rewarded aerodynamic efficiency and engine reliability above all else, and the regularly elevated speeds made mechanical survival a primary challenge.
In 1996, CART organised a second Michigan event — the U.S. 500 — scheduled on the same day as the Indianapolis 500, as a direct counter-programming move against the rival Indy Racing League. The U.S. 500 drew many of CART's top entrants who had left or been excluded from Indianapolis. It ran only that single year before being discontinued.
Michigan's combination of constant high-speed cornering and abrasive surface conditions made the race notoriously hard on equipment. High attrition was a fixture: twelve drivers scored their first — and in several cases, their only — Indy car race win at Michigan, a figure that reflects how frequently the frontrunners failed to finish. Michael Andretti and Scott Goodyear each won the Michigan 500 twice. Tony Kanaan won both a 500-mile and a later 400-mile race at the venue.
On 26 July 1998, during a CART event at Michigan Speedway, a crash involving Adrian Fernandez sent a tyre over the catchfencing and into the grandstands, killing three spectators and injuring six more. The incident prompted an immediate increase in the height of the protective fencing around the track. The event served as a stark reminder of the speeds being reached at Michigan and the risks they posed beyond the cockpit.
CART sanctioned the Michigan 500 through 2001. In 2002, as CART's commercial and political position deteriorated, the Indy Racing League assumed the sanctioning rights and shortened the race distance to 400 miles. The IRL held the event annually until 2007, after which no renewal agreement was reached and open-wheel racing at Michigan ended — at least through 2025, when no IndyCar events had returned to the facility.
The Michigan 500's place in CART history rests on its speed records, its role as one of the few genuine 500-mile prestige races outside Indianapolis, and the fierce competition it generated among CART's strongest teams across two decades. The Marlboro sponsorship years in particular represent the peak of superspeedway CART racing, an era defined by wheel-to-wheel battles at speeds that have not been replicated in comparable open-wheel competition since.