Homestead-Miami Speedway names Santa Cruz track president
With decades of award-winning experience in the media world bringing world-class athletic competition to both the casual and ardent fan, Guillermo Santa Cruz is ready to take on his next great challenge, leading the South Florida motorsports market as the newly named president of Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“It’s an exciting time to be a sports fan in South Florida, and having grown up here and spending nearly my entire life working in sports, it’s a great honor to join the NASCAR family and be handed the keys to Homestead-Miami Speedway,” Santa Cruz said. “I believe in the future of Homestead, both the city and the track, and I can’t wait to get started.”
Santa Cruz’s resume is hugely diverse and highly decorated. From his start working for Univision and Telemundo to his recent position as IMG’s vice president, Latin America, Mexico and US Hispanic where he managed everything from sales and client relations to a more intensive focus on sports and entertainment programs for the Latin American region.
At NBC-Telemundo, Santa Cruz was part of the 2004 Sports Emmy Award-winning team covering the Olympics. He worked as a producer and received a “special citation” from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences for coverage of the September 11, 2001 tragedy.
He was also part of the Univision team that earned the prestigious Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Newscast for its coverage of the Centennial Olympic Park bombing during the 1996 Olympics.
Born in Puerto Rico and raised in Miami to Cuban ex-patriate parents, Santa Cruz is especially proud to lead a big-time motorsports facility in his hometown — an area he knows well and an audience he has already long served.
“I was really intrigued as a sports fan and someone who grew up in South Florida,” Santa Cruz said. “There’s room for growth and it presented a professional challenge for me and a chance to spread my wings; it’s just a wonderful opportunity.
“My whole professional life has been here [in South Florida] but never in the ‘local’ sense, I’ve always worked more in national and international media. This gives me the opportunity to work in a local market in the community where I grew up.”
Between his background as a leader in big-time sports on the world stage and his close, lifelong ties to the Homestead-Miami market, the fit seemed natural.
“Guillermo’s vast experience in the competitive media market will help grow Homestead-Miami Speedway into its next phase as one of the preeminent motorsports facilities,” said Chip Wile, NASCAR’s senior vice president and chief track properties officer. “He has a diverse background in sales, production, and promotion in a key market for HMS and will offer unique opportunities for the team to expand the track’s influence.”
Santa Cruz says that from his very first days of work he plans to focus on the Homestead community that has played host to the facility and the sport for nearly 30 years. He sees a lot of untapped potential in the surrounding area and wants to prioritize building relationships with the local community and potential stakeholders.
“I have a good feel for the market and the community because I’m part of that market and community,” Santa Cruz said. “I have the advantage of growing up here and having a feel for different cultures.
“There is a real strength to South Florida in how diverse it is. I don’t have to learn that it comes built-in and that’s a big advantage for me.”
Santa Cruz is well aware of how much the competitors like racing at the 1.5-mile Homestead-Miami oval, and he’s optimistic that kind of enthusiasm and the promise for compelling competition and unique entertainment can raise the profile of the facility sooner than later.
“If the drivers like it, that means the racing is good and if the racing is good, the fans will come,” Santa Cruz said. “So many sports events cycle through South Florida and people from all over the world come to South Florida, where motorsports is incredibly popular internationally.
“There are so many opportunities for our track.”
While Santa Cruz begins his term overseeing the track this week, Al Garcia, a longtime member of the HMS executive team and president of Homestead-Miami Speedway since 2019, will continue to work with the facility’s leadership in an advisory consultant position.
“Al has been a key part of Homestead-Miami Speedway literally since its inception in 1995,” Wile said. “We’re grateful for everything he has done to make HMS a premier sports facility in South Florida and look forward to continuing to work with him in his new role.”
The first big NASCAR race weekend for Santa Cruz and the track will come this fall as it hosts a playoff tripleheader weekend. The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and Xfinity Series will race on Saturday, Oct. 26 (starting at noon ET), with the weekend culminating with the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs 400-miler on Sunday, Oct. 27 (2:30 p.m. ET, NBC, NBC Sports App, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
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