Tom Cruise Wants ARCA To Let Him Actually Race For The Days Of Thunder Sequel, Not Just Pose For Cameras
For his upcoming movie, Tom Cruise isn’t content with just driving on camera this time. NASCAR CEO Steve O’Donnell confirmed on Tuesday that Cruise asked to compete in an actual ARCA Menards Series race while preparing to reprise Cole Trickle for the Days of Thunder sequel, and the answer wasn’t no.
“I was shocked,” O’Donnell said during an interview at Front Office Sports’ Tuned In conference. “We have an ARCA racing series, which is kind of our national touring series, and Tom wanted to go race in one of those. I’m not sure that’s going to happen. But he wants it to be as authentic as it can be.” That’s not a rejection, but a CEO admitting his organization is actually mulling the idea.
Cruise Has Been Chasing This Since 1987
This isn’t a movie star playing dress-up for a press junket. Motorsport reports, Cruise tested a Busch Series car at Daytona with Hendrick Motorsports back in 1987 alongside Paul Newman, topping out around 178 mph before engine trouble cut his session short. That test is the reason Days of Thunder exists at all. He also drove a Red Bull F1 car at Willow Springs in 2011, so the man has logged real seat time in machinery most actors never touch.
None of that is the same as racing wheel-to-wheel against a 20-car ARCA field, which is exactly the gap Cruise reportedly wants to close. O’Donnell framed it as Cruise pushing NASCAR to show the sport as it actually is in 2026, not the garage-built version audiences saw in 1990. “It’s embracing, you know, instead of a car being put together back in the garage, it’s embracing the technology, everything that goes into the sport,” O’Donnell said.
ARCA Is The Logical Entry Point, And Also The Riskiest
ARCA makes sense as the series Cruise would target. NASCAR bought the Automobile Racing Club of America in 2018 and runs it as the de facto fourth tier below Cup, the O’Reilly Series, and Trucks. The barrier to entry is genuinely low compared to those divisions — low enough that 15-year-olds and YouTuber Cleetus McFarland have both made ARCA starts in recent seasons.
That low floor is also the problem. ARCA fields mix green teenagers with journeymen who’ve spent years trying and failing to climb into NASCAR’s national series, plus a handful of veterans over 50 still chasing wins — sixth-place points runner Michael Maples is 62. Equipment quality varies wildly from car to car, which produces exactly the kind of unpredictable, closing-speed chaos that makes ARCA races notoriously messy. Dropping a 64-year-old actor into that mix, even a motivated one, is a real safety conversation.
O’Donnell Didn’t Say Yes, Nor Did He Say No
O’Donnell could have shut this down in one sentence. He didn’t. “I’m not sure that’s going to happen” is a CEO leaving the door cracked while NASCAR works out whether Cruise could clear a pre-season Daytona test, line up a car and sponsor, and satisfy whatever safety sign-off the series would require.
The stakes for NASCAR go well past one actor’s ego. The sequel is in production for a June 2028 release, with NASCAR building more than 80 cars for filming and drivers like Carson Hocevar already briefing Cruise’s team since January. If NASCAR lets him make an ARCA start, it’s betting that authenticity sells the sport to a new audience the way Brad Pitt’s F1 film did for open-wheel racing. If it says no, Cruise still gets his authenticity story — just without the actual green flag.
Sources: Front Office Sports News via YouTube, Motorsport
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