I got bad news today

mantis

Hello everyone,
I learned Atco Dragway Park closed today. I've been racing there since the 1980's . I raced 4 different vehicles and I was planning on going soon. Now those plans are gone.

Im deeply saddened by this news and I'm not sure how to take it. I know nothing lasts forever but I was my happy place.

This world , personally for me I have lost a lot. This is the one thing I could escape and enjoy myself for a few hours.

I know Cicil Dragway is down somewhere in Delaware or wherever it is. I'll have to find out exactly where it is and I guess I can do my racing there. It's not my home but I have no choice.

nooshinjohn

Sorry to hear... All my happy places are gone as well, and the one that hurts most was my Grandma's house. My Grand-dad's prized Red Maple and his Colorado Blue Spruce, that I promised him I would be taller than one day, are now the FRIKKEN parking lot for a Costco in Eagan Mn...

PSOVLSK

Gotta be honest, that’s better than the news I thought I was going to read when I opened the thread. Yeah, this stinks, but I’m sure glad you or a family member didn’t get a bad diagnosis etc.

ZLTFUL

That sucks.

Bandimere in CO is closing at the end of their season this year too. No more Mile High Nats...something I have spectated at dozens of times over the years. Sad.

newbie308

Is Englishtown still open? I saw the post on FB this morning regarding Atco. That sucks! I watched a lot of great races there. I'll never forget the first time my dad took me and we went down on the track and I lost my sneaker because it stuck to the hot rubber on the track

Emlyn

Sounds like the owner got an offer he couldn't refuse.

bcwsrt

I guess nobody’s gonna be wanting to race electric cars. Which is understandable.

sucks2beme

Taxes and insurance are up. Add to it the green people. It all is putting
pressure on tracks. I'm pretty sure someone is plotting the demise of
racing fuel as well.

Gerres26

mantis wrote: »

Hello everyone,
I learned Atco Dragway Park closed today. I've been racing there since the 1980's . I raced 4 different vehicles and I was planning on going soon. Now those plans are gone.

Im deeply saddened by this news and I'm not sure how to take it. I know nothing lasts forever but I was my happy place.

This world , personally for me I have lost a lot. This is the one thing I could escape and enjoy myself for a few hours.

I know Cicil Dragway is down somewhere in Delaware or wherever it is. I'll have to find out exactly where it is and I guess I can do my racing there. It's not my home but I have no choice.

Cecil County Dragway is in the Rising Sun/North East area, which is actually in Maryland. Not even 10 minutes down the road from me. I spent a lot of my high school Friday and Saturday nights there. Although I haven’t been in years, it seems to still be going pretty strong so it may be worth you checking out.

mantis

Gerres26 wrote: »

mantis wrote: »

Hello everyone,
I learned Atco Dragway Park closed today. I've been racing there since the 1980's . I raced 4 different vehicles and I was planning on going soon. Now those plans are gone.

Im deeply saddened by this news and I'm not sure how to take it. I know nothing lasts forever but I was my happy place.

This world , personally for me I have lost a lot. This is the one thing I could escape and enjoy myself for a few hours.

I know Cicil Dragway is down somewhere in Delaware or wherever it is. I'll have to find out exactly where it is and I guess I can do my racing there. It's not my home but I have no choice.

Cecil County Dragway is in the Rising Sun/North East area, which is actually in Maryland. Not even 10 minutes down the road from me. I spent a lot of my high school Friday and Saturday nights there. Although I haven’t been in years, it seems to still be going pretty strong so it may be worth you checking out.

It's the closest track to me that I can get to and home in a day. Hopefully it's as good as Atco was but I now have this hole in my chest about this. Cars are every bit as important to me as audio and guitar stuff. It's one of if not my biggest hobby. Having a fast car on the street doesn't even make any sense. I love going to the track and now that's gone .

Jstas

Cecil County Dragway is about 45-50 minutes south of Atco and it's only 45 minutes because it takes a while to get to I295 from Atco. Without traffic, you can get from the I295/Rt42 interchange to Rising Sun in 30-45 minutes depending on how much you care about speed limits. Your slowdowns are going to be around Philly and Wilmington, DE if you're coming from PA.

Cecil Country Dragway is only about 4 miles off of Exit 100A on I95 in Maryland.

https://cecilcountydragway.com/

The nice thing about Cecil is it's downhill.

bcwsrt

A downhill drag strip? Ugh.

Jstas

Depending on where you are, though, Island Dragway may be closer for you.

https://www.islanddragway.com/

There's also Maple Grove:

https://www.maplegroveraceway.com/

And Maryland International Raceway is a bit farther than Cecil being out in Budds Creek and south of DC it's a 3 hour drive for me. Not doable on a Friday after work but get up and out the door early on a Saturday and you can make a 9 AM gate time no problem:

https://goracemir.com/

And there's Numidia in Catawissa, PA

https://www.numidiadragway.com/

And, you have to watch their calendar but, NJMP does do bracket racing with a temporary setup from time to time on one of the straightaways. The track prep is minimal and won't support high horsepower cars but if all you're doing is running a factory stock Dodge on radial street tires (even drag radials are radial street tires) then the minimal track prep is going to be all you need. It's usually cheap, the facility is huge and the food is good. Plus it's in a beautiful part of NJ.

https://njmp.com/

Hell, all these listed tracks are in beautiful areas. Island is basically on some guy's farm up near the Delaware Water Gap, Maple Grove is in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains out near Reading, Budds Creek is about as rural as it gets in Maryland, there's probably more cows there than people. Numidia is in the Poconos and even Cecil is on Racine Farms land and with the layout of the track it's just a nice place to be.


It sucks that Atco closed. A very large portion of my automotive racing career happened there being as it's not even 15 minutes from my front door so believe me, I feel the pain and I'm pretty angry as I find out more about what happened and why but Atco is not the only one in the area. It was probably the most accessible but mismanagement and essentially greed with a disregard for the surrounding area is what led to the situation.

Jstas

bcwsrt wrote: »

A downhill drag strip? Ugh.

It's not actually down hill.

Because of how the run up to the starting line is, if you're standing near the burnout box, the track looks like it's down hill. But standing on the starting line, it's flat. It's a running joke in the area that people talk about running their best times at Cecil and others will respond with "Yeah, well, it's downhill so that makes sense!"

Cecil did a survey, though, and showed everyone that from about 25 feet behind the starting line to the finish line there's less than 1 degree of inclination down the entire length of the track and the elevation changes are measured in inches with the end of the track past the finish line actually going up hill on a 2% grade.

Cecil runs good times because it's out in the sticks, in a valley and only a few feet above sea level. The air is cold and with the lack of trees the track stays hot during the day. So the air is dense and the track is sticky so everything runs good. So good that Cecil breaks more cars than any other track I've been to because stuff makes power and hooks hard.

Atco was the same way when I was a teenager and in my early 20's. It was fast because it was in the middle of the woods, track prep was good and it was like 17 feet above sea level. That meant cold, dense air for big power. It didn't matter if it was a Tuesday, Thursday, Friday or Sunday, everyone was going to Atco and then ownership changed and it kinda went to hell. It got unsafe and a group of racers bought the track from the guy and fixed it. It got good for a little while and then the current owners who just sold it bought it. That was when the bar came and new bleachers were installed. Then, a year later the NHRA changed the safety rules because of the one bad accident where the driver lost control when the parachutes failed, blasted right through the runoff gravel at the end because it was too short for a car traveling 320+ MPH and impacted the retaining wall at the end. NHRA wouldn't let Atco run anything faster than, like 170 MPH more than an 1/8th mile. Atco owners didn't want to make the necessary improvements for safety and full running, blamed The Pinelands Commission for nixing the track extension and blamed the NHRA for abandoning the track. The Pinelands Commission stated that they never saw a proposal to even review let alone deny and the NHRA was still running small series races there just not doing the big speed, big points races because of the safety concerns. Atco had offers from local companies whose owners all raced at Atco offering to help and that was turned down. They were just looking for an out and didn't really care about what the track meant to the local community. That's why Atco is gone and it's sad, angering and disappointing all at the same time.

DaveHo

Maplegrove is not too far. World class strip.

SIHAB

I say death race 2000 or bust!

mantis

Jstas wrote: »

Cecil County Dragway is about 45-50 minutes south of Atco and it's only 45 minutes because it takes a while to get to I295 from Atco. Without traffic, you can get from the I295/Rt42 interchange to Rising Sun in 30-45 minutes depending on how much you care about speed limits. Your slowdowns are going to be around Philly and Wilmington, DE if you're coming from PA.

Cecil Country Dragway is only about 4 miles off of Exit 100A on I95 in Maryland.

https://cecilcountydragway.com/

The nice thing about Cecil is it's downhill.

I'm absolutely going to make some passes there later this year probably when the weather breaks into fall. I'll plan a full day there. Thanks man.

mantis

Jstas wrote: »

Depending on where you are, though, Island Dragway may be closer for you.

https://www.islanddragway.com/

There's also Maple Grove:

https://www.maplegroveraceway.com/

And Maryland International Raceway is a bit farther than Cecil being out in Budds Creek and south of DC it's a 3 hour drive for me. Not doable on a Friday after work but get up and out the door early on a Saturday and you can make a 9 AM gate time no problem:

https://goracemir.com/

And there's Numidia in Catawissa, PA

https://www.numidiadragway.com/

And, you have to watch their calendar but, NJMP does do bracket racing with a temporary setup from time to time on one of the straightaways. The track prep is minimal and won't support high horsepower cars but if all you're doing is running a factory stock Dodge on radial street tires (even drag radials are radial street tires) then the minimal track prep is going to be all you need. It's usually cheap, the facility is huge and the food is good. Plus it's in a beautiful part of NJ.

https://njmp.com/

Hell, all these listed tracks are in beautiful areas. Island is basically on some guy's farm up near the Delaware Water Gap, Maple Grove is in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains out near Reading, Budds Creek is about as rural as it gets in Maryland, there's probably more cows there than people. Numidia is in the Poconos and even Cecil is on Racine Farms land and with the layout of the track it's just a nice place to be.


It sucks that Atco closed. A very large portion of my automotive racing career happened there being as it's not even 15 minutes from my front door so believe me, I feel the pain and I'm pretty angry as I find out more about what happened and why but Atco is not the only one in the area. It was probably the most accessible but mismanagement and essentially greed with a disregard for the surrounding area is what led to the situation.

Thanks, I'll look into al of that. Maybe try both and see what strip I like better.

treitz3

I heard rumors that you were leasing your vehicle(s). Are you?

Tom