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360 Sprint Car teams please note this press release:
Track Will Cap Off Season With 7th Annual Thunder At The Ridge Scheduled for September 28th & 29th
St. Cloud, MN (For immediate release: June 25th, 2007)
The
Management team at Fox Ridge Speedway in Arcadia, WI has announced
plans to suspend weekly racing action for the remainder of its 2007
racing schedule with hopes the economy will pick back up in the area in
order to keep the track alive for years to come. The current situation
of the local and regional economy, higher than normal gas prices,
coupled with the fact that there are 4 other dirt tracks racing on
Friday nights within a 150 mile radius of Fox Ridge (Fountain City,
Menomonie, Unity and Cresco) have caused the attendance numbers to be
well below what was expected to be for the start of this 2007 racing
season.
With that said, FRS promoter Chris Stepan said “It is
no secret that the economy here in the Arcadia area is struggling right
now. Major companies are laying off employees and cutting back hours
causing local potential race attendants to re-evaluate their spending
habits coupled with the fact that large area sponsors are cutting
sponsorship dollars, this has certainly caused our attendance numbers
to not be where we believe they should be early in the season. Also,
again it’s no secret that with Tri Oval racing on the same night as us
only 20 miles down the road, our fans and racers have been split up and
have been forced to choose where to go and who to support on Friday
nights. Add in the fact that the Red Cedar Speedway in Menomonie, WI
races on Friday nights, the Central Wisconsin Raceway in Unity, WI just
re-opened on Friday nights and the Cresco Speedway in Cresco, IA
switched from Sundays to Fridays this season, there are just too many
dirt tracks in this area racing on Friday nights. None of us are going
to survive if we keep racing against each other!”
So, FRS
management, along with the board of directors for the Dirt Track Racing
Association (DTRA) and the weekly regular racers at Fox Ridge conducted
multiple meetings over the past 2 weeks to see if a resolution could be
discussed to try to keep racing alive in Arcadia. The decision was made
to ask the city of Arcadia if they will allow the track to switch to
Thursday or Saturday nights for the remainder of the 2007 season as a
trial period to see if a different weekly night would make any positive
difference in attendance and race car drivers, however that was deemed
not to be a viable option at this time. Again Stepan said “Myself, Dave
(Hesch) and the rest of the management team sat down and put numbers on
paper to determine if it was feasible to reduce our purse and keep the
doors open for regular scheduled weekly shows, but after coming up with
a drastically reduced purse structure and asking the loyal drivers what
they thought, the decision was made that it was not fair to the drivers
to force them to race for a reduced purse and it was not feasible to
continue to operate at a loss each race night, so the incredibly
difficult decision was made to suspend weekly racing at the Ridge. No
one feels worse than Dave does about this decision. It is an awful
thing when a track is forced to close the doors, but unfortunately
there just wasn’t any viable option to keep the doors open and not
operate at a loss at this current time. We just can not jeopardize the
future of the track by running at a considerable loss each week at the
current time. Hopefully the economy will get better in the area and
people will have additional spending money in the near future and we
can re-evaluate the schedule and possibly add some additional dates
either in 2007 or for sure in 2008.”
Dave and Judy stated “We
would like to extend a huge thank you to everyone who patronized and
supported Fox Ridge Speedway over the years. To our outstanding,
faithful, caring employees, without you we would not have followed this
dream for 6 1/2 years. To the drivers and many great fans, thank you
for continuing to support us and the sport of auto racing. We have had
some great times with all of you and have made many new friends and we
hope that we will be able to continue racing at Fox Ridge in the near
future.”
The Fox Ridge Speedway will cap off the ’07 season with
the 7th annual Thunder at the Ridge event on Friday and Saturday,
September 28th and 29th of this year. Practice will be held on Thursday
night, September 27th from 6-10pm with a party to follow in the Fox
Ridge Lounge. All 5 regular divisions will be in action, including the
Open Modifieds, DTRA Super Stocks, DTRA Street Stocks, DTRA Midwest
Modifieds and the Fox Ridge 4-cylinder Hornets. The tire rule will be
open and we will allow both Goodyears and Hoosiers for this event in
all classes. Draw Cut Off will be at 7:00pm, hot laps will begin at
7:15pm, with racing to begin shortly after. For more information,
please check out www.foxridgespeedway.com or call (608) 323-3132.
Please stay tuned to www.foxridgespeedway.com for our updated schedule
announcements. The updated schedule will be on the website shortly, but
the plans are for it to look like this:
Remaining 2007 Fox Ridge Speedway Racing Schedule
Thursday, September 27th – Thunder at the Ridge (Practice 6p-10p/Party 10p-2a)
Friday, September 28th – Thunder at the Ridge (7:30pm start time)
Saturday, September 29th - Thunder at the Ridge (7:30pm start time)
Sunday, September 30th – Thunder at the Ridge (Rain Date - 1pm if necc.)
Stan Meissner
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