The Honda Indy that has raced around Exhibition Place for 40 years will move in 2026 to Markham under a five-year agreement — a change sparked by scheduling conflicts with the FIFA World Cup but one that some say could see Toronto lose the race for decades to come.
The move, announced Wednesday, means Toronto will lose part of the $50 million the race added to Ontario’s economy and the 150,000 fans it attracted in 2024. Toronto officials appeared caught off guard, unsure of how many years IndyCar had committed to Markham and hopeful of wooing the racing series back to the city.
The race has been hosted at Exhibition Place since 1986 and is the second-longest running IndyCar street race. It was operating on one-year contracts with the city the past two years.
“There’s a lot of cities lining up right now to be an NTT IndyCar Series host,” said Jeff Atkinson, president of the race. “If we took a year off from Exhibition Place and Ontario, this event may never come back. So we did not want to be on a series of one-year revolving contracts.”
Frank Scarpitti, mayor of Markham, said the race will “transform the streets of our city into a car racing crucible, testing the limits of some of the world’s fastest car drivers and welcoming the world to watch it all unfold.”
“Markham is geared up and ready to embrace the spotlight.”
Despite the last of Toronto’s World Cup games taking place on July 2, 2026, FIFA’s contract with Exhibition Place stretches to the end of July, conflicting with the Honda Indy’s normal schedule of mid-to-late July, according to Don Boyle, CEO of Exhibition Place. With the CNE starting up on the grounds in mid-August, “there wasn’t another weekend we could move it to.”
The 2025 Honda Indy was the most successful ever held at Exhibition Place, Boyle said, with record suite sales and attendance.
Boyle said it is “definitely a concern” the race may never return, but said it would have minimal financial impact. Exhibition Place will lose roughly $650,000 a year from the move, which Boyle believes it can make up through other events, such as a Formula E race, which it has been looking at.
In Markham, the new temporary track will be built near the downtown core, just off Highway 407. The pit lane will be housed in the Unionville GO station parking lot and the track will snake around the Markham YMCA, York University’s Markham campus and the Markham Pan Am Centre.
“We’re not gonna be here for one year, we’re not gonna be here for five years,” said Bud Denker, president of the Penske Corporation, which owns IndyCar. “We’re gonna be here for decades in this marketplace.”
Mayor Olivia Chow conceded Toronto “will miss the Indy.”
Speaking to reporters Wednesday at an unrelated event, she said the city “worked really hard” with organizers to find a way to stage the race next year either before or after the World Cup, but “somehow the Indy did not want to do that.”
“So we didn’t have much choice,” she said.
Chow depicted Canada’s largest city as the natural home for the race, citing the number of tourists drawn to it each year for its many festivals and events. “How many people would actually show up (in) Markham?” she said.
The mayor appeared caught off guard by the details of the Markham announcement, however. She initially asserted that the move was “for next year only,” and said “we will do our best to bring them back after (the) World Cup is over.” Her office later confirmed the race won’t be staged in Toronto for several years at least.
On Wednesday morning, Boyle was also unsure how long the agreement was for. He said Atkinson, the race president, wasn’t answering his calls.
“I’m like, ‘Jeff, where are you?’” Boyle said.
In addition to the World Cup, Exhibition Place has become an increasingly complex site due to construction for the Ontario Line and the expansion of Hotel X, according to Pat Tobin, general manager of Toronto’s economic development and culture division.
He said it was because of those complications that Indy organizers had only entered into one-year agreements for the race in recent years after a three-year contract ended in 2023.
The city “had signalled a desire to talk about a multi-year agreement,” but organizers didn’t bite, according to Tobin. He said Toronto wasn’t privy to details of the Markham agreement and he couldn’t say why efforts to keep the race in Toronto had fallen short.
He called the Honda Indy a “great event” that has had a “huge economic impact” on the city. According to a 2024 report to the Exhibition Place board, each year it fuelled demand for more than 33,000 room nights in the city, and supported 450 full-year jobs in the GTA.
While Toronto would like to ensure all “marquee events” like the Honda Indy stick around for the long-term, “that’s just unfortunately not possible in all instances,” he said.
Despite the World Cup playing a role in the Indy leaving town, Tobin said Toronto remains confident that the global soccer tournament will be an economic boon for the city.
“I think the positives will outweigh the negatives, economically, socially, culturally for sure,” he said. The city expects the World Cup to contribute $940 million to the GTA’ s economic output.
Sara Anghel, president and CEO of the Greater Toronto Hotel Association, agreed. She believes the loss suffered by Toronto’s hospitality industry next year will be partially covered by the influx of traffic for the World Cup.
“We might see some loss, but we won’t know until closer to the date,” she said. “But based on the facts, with FIFA coming to Toronto, maybe this is an opportunity to make everything a little bit better for all the events happening in 2026.”
Meanwhile, Markham hoteliers are ecstatic over the opportunity, Anghel added. “I’m cautiously optimistic in this case, that it’s not going to be a negative to (Toronto) and an opportunity for the GTA” as Markham continues to develop.
On the race side of things, drivers are mostly feeling “excited,” according to Tim Hauraney, an F1 and IndyCar insider with TSN and former professional driver.
It’s a bit early to tell exactly how the new track would compare to the old one. But it’s made a good first impression so far.
“It looks fast, and it looks like there’s a lot of passing opportunities,” Hauraney said. “There are some exciting turns on there that could really raise the hair on the back of your neck.”
The temporary street circuit in Markham will run 3.52 kilometres and feature “a double-sided pit lane, thrilling straightaways and technically challenging sectors,” a press release said. Markham has already begun early work on the track and festival site.
There’s bound to be some frustration from racers who, after growing used to Exhibition Place, must learn a new track. But that’s part of the sport, Hauraney said: “Sometimes, that’s what separates the good drivers from the great drivers.”
He also anticipates the Markham circuit to be smoother than driving in “really bumpy, rough track” at Exhibition Place.
“The city streets of Toronto, racing a formula car on them, are not good for your body — because they really punish you,” he said. “But it is also part of its charm.”
The race weekend will run from Aug. 14 to 16.
Green Savoree, the company that organizes and promotes the race, cited the significant growth in York Region and its “excellent regional access” via two 400-series highways, the VIVA transit system and Unionville GO station.
One Fort York resident, Lisa Bassett said she is disappointed and shocked by the move.
“It’s an amazing family-friendly event that we look forward to every year in the neighbourhood. People come from all over, it improves businesses in the area. All the restaurants are busy,” said Bassett, who has lived in the area for 12 years. “All of those are going to be quiet.”
Al Grant, who lives at Bathurst Street and Lake Shore Boulevard, said those who live in the area have mixed feelings about the race. There’s an appreciation for the event, as well as complaints about the traffic. Grant, though, is disappointed by the move.
“I hope this is not the beginning of the end of the Indy,” he said. “It, to me, is almost as synonymous with Toronto and the summer events as Caribana (and) the Ex.”
