Back in 1979, the late and great Mickey Thompson put together an indoor off-road event that took place in various stadiums, including the Los Angeles Coliseum. This series inspired likely one of the most awesome storyline arcade games of the 1980s, Ivan “Ironman” Stewart’s Super Off-Road. By 1996, eight years after Thompson’s murder, the entire series went bankrupt and closed up shop.

Well, Robby Gordon, NASCAR driver and son of former off-road legend, “Baja Bob” Gordon, has brought back the series under the name of Robby Gordon’s Stadium Super Trucks.

In modern times, this series might actually survive, with stations like ESPN2, SpeedTV, and other specialty channels to give it plenty of airtime. What makes this series better than the more long-distance off-road series, like Baja Racing and off-road rallies, is the fact that given the small area it covers, it is easier to film for TV.

The season kicks off in 2013 and there are some pretty impressive awards for a startup racing series, as each race pays the winning driver $40,000, the 2nd place driver gets $15,000 and the 3rd place driver takes home $5,000. In addition to money per race, there is a payout to the series champion of $500,000. Yeah, it’s not NASCAR money, but for a startup like this, that is pretty decent.

Making things even more interesting, Gordon has invited old-time off-road racers Danny Thompson, Ivan “Ironman” Stewart, and Walker Evans to participate. Other drivers already locked in include: supercross and off-road race Ricky Johnson, NASCAR Truck Series racer Justin Lofton, off-road stars Justin Matney, Jessie Johnson, Luke Johnson, Andrew Caddell and Casey Currie, and rally star Samuel Hubinette.

The only sponsor listed for the series so far is R/C car builders Traxxas, so we will have to see if the series can attract more sponsorship, which should be too hard, given it is not directly competing with any other series.

Gordon promised to release more information as we get closer to the series debut, so we will pass more info on to you as it becomes available.

Second video after the jump.