Gates have closed on at least this season.
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Gates have closed on at least this season.
Wow. It just opened back up. What’s the deal?
Too big, not racey, hard on motors. Beautiful place, but not sure why he ever expected to draw cars.
There’s a reason that place never stays open long. Until somebody carves a nice 1/4-3/8 out of it the track will never succeed.
Maybe too many racetracks near by for one thing?
Bulldoze it and start over. Make another Fairbury!! These cars are not meant to race on super speedways.
That’s what I though
1/2 mile Lancaster SC has no problem bringing in fans. Not huge car Count for weekly racing but good enough. Stands are pretty full every week.
The track was rented/leased to a company that trained equipment operators. They built a new 3&4. Not sure how many races were run but not many. IMO, would need to fully bulldoze the whole thing and start over as the turns arc is too wide. A 1/4 mile would essentially be a circle if they plan to use the existing wall.
But main issue as mentioned is, too many tracks already in operation in that area.
To be clear, never been there. Grew up in Weston WV. Sister lives 10 minutes from track. I just don't like those freight train tracks.
Tim Hitt about knocked a hole in the wall once when upper control arm bolts pulled out of the bungs. Wrong bolts...wasn't tracks fault. Just ton of load revealed a weakness. Don't think he raced there again.
Here's the thing that I've always told people. "It's not a track problem, it's a late model problem."
In the late 90s, early 00's, teams raced there. The DTWC drew 139 and 140 supers on back-to-back years. Racefest drew 86 cars running against the DTWC one year. What does that tell you? It was just as hard on equipment then. So what's changed? The cost to operate a super late model, the cost to operate a dirt modified. If the costs hadn't skyrocketed, drivers wouldn't be so reluctant to race there.
No, it doesn't race great, like most large tracks. It's big, and fast, but I was slightly impressed by how well it raced Saturday night of this season's Historic 100. Satterlee and Alberson made some good passes among others.
It's a shame that the future of WVMS doesn't look bright, the facility itself is amazing, and the sport is rich with big moments at that venue. I remember being a kid and watching Bloomer punt Freddy Smith and the crowd going bonkers. Bart Hartman dominated races there often lapping up until 3rd or 4th place. The 2010 Hillbilly 100 was the biggest crowd I've ever seen there, there had to have been 15,000 people, Bloomer won that night.
Let's act like money isn't a problem for a moment, build a 1/4 mile race track that resembles FALS or Davenport Iowa's new speedway. Davenport is actually a great model WVMS could try to copy. The current business model of running 10,000 to win events isn't going to work on the big track, make the track in the middle since there's plenty room and run 4-5 races a year, maybe even race 1 night on the big track.
I'll catch flack for this, but I also wouldn't mind seeing it paved. Pave the big track and build the dirt track in the middle. Obviously, both would take time and money, but seeing as how Cody and crew have already poured everything into the venue itself, let's keep it running by doing one of the options above.
Davenport Speedway is a perfect example. In between at 1/4 and 3/8 is the sweet spot for late models. Miss the speed of the big track, but racing and car counts tell the story. More cars and better racing on the smaller track. Which isn’t new, it’s been there for a long, long time.
They had a country music festival planned for last year that got cancelled so they rescheduled it a couple weeks ago. I always thought they pulled the plug last year because of low presale. From the pictures I saw they took a major money hit on it. They even mention devastating low attendance for the concert in their release. For all the experts that have never been there, the 2 closest tracks are Ohio Valley and Tyler County which are both promoted by the same Watson family.