The SCCA traces its roots to the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA), founded in 1933 by brothers Miles and Sam Collier. ARCA dissolved in 1941 at the outbreak of World War II, and its former members regrouped to form the SCCA in 1944. The SCCA began sanctioning road racing in 1948 with the inaugural Watkins Glen Grand Prix. Cameron Argetsinger, an SCCA member and local enthusiast who later became Director of Pro Racing and Executive Director of the SCCA, helped organise the event.
In 1951, the SCCA National Sports Car Championship was formed from existing marquee events around the nation, including Watkins Glen, Pebble Beach, and Elkhart Lake. Many early SCCA events were held on disused air force bases with the help of Air Force General Curtis LeMay, a renowned sports car racing enthusiast, who loaned out Strategic Air Command facilities. The SCCA relied heavily on these venues during the early and mid-1950s during the transition from street racing to permanent circuits.
By 1962, the SCCA was tasked with managing the U.S. World Sportscar Championship rounds at Daytona, Sebring, Bridgehampton, and Watkins Glen. The club was also involved in the Formula 1 U.S. Grand Prix. SCCA Executive Director John Bishop helped create the United States Road Racing Championship series for Group 7 sports cars, to recover races taken by the rival USAC Road Racing Championship. Bishop was also instrumental in founding the Trans-Am Series and the Can-Am series.
In 1969, tension and infighting over Pro Racing's autonomy caused Bishop to resign and help form the International Motor Sports Association.
The SCCA dropped its amateur-only policy in 1962 and began sanctioning professional racing. The Canadian-American Challenge Cup (Can-Am) for Group 7 open-top sportscars was created in 1966, as was the Trans-Am Series for pony cars. A professional series for open-wheel cars was introduced in 1967 as the SCCA Grand Prix Championship, continuing under various names through to the 1976 SCCA/USAC Formula 5000 Championship.
The Club Racing programme is a road racing division where drivers race on dedicated race tracks or temporary street circuits. The annual national championship is called the SCCA National Championship Runoffs, held at venues including Riverside International Raceway (1964, 1966, 1968), Daytona International Speedway (1965, 1967, 1969, 2015), Road Atlanta (1970–1993), Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course (1994–2005, 2016), Road America (2009–2013, 2020), and Indianapolis Motor Speedway (2017). The current SCCA record holder is Jerry Hansen, with twenty-seven national championships.
The SCCA sanctions a wide range of activities. Its autocross programme, branded "Solo", runs up to four cars at a time on cone-laid courses on large paved surfaces. The annual Solo national championship is held in September; since 2009, Solo Nationals have been staged at the Lincoln Airpark in Lincoln, Nebraska. The ProSolo format pairs two cars simultaneously on mirror-image courses with drag-racing-style starts.
Rallycross events are run on non-paved courses. The SCCA sanctioned ProRally, a national performance rally series, until the end of the 2004 season; Rally America picked up both ProRally and ClubRally from 2005.
Track Night in America is a low-barrier track experience programme that has run approximately 150 events per year at circuits including Road America, Virginia International Raceway, Sebring, and Lime Rock, attracting nearly 10,000 entrants annually. As of 2024 it had been running for ten years.
The SCCA is organised into six conferences, nine divisions, and 115 regions to make events accessible throughout the country.
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