THORNBURG, VA – When Dominion Raceway opens on April 9th, the focus will be entertaining and engaging spectators and fans.
Track owner Steve Britt and general manager Edwin Pardue both feel the racing itself will be entertaining for the fans but that more has to be done in the 21st century than just holding a race. At Old Dominion Speedway, Britt worked with longtime race promoter Richard “Dickie” Gore, who was actually the grand architect of Late Model Stock Car racing.
“You’ve got to remember that most of this is learned at this point and we learn by watching successful people do things and obviously, [the Gore family] is great at running racetracks and that’s one of the things that they taught us,” Britt said. “The Gore family was about making a racetrack financially viable and that gets into what you paying in a purse and how much you charge for a hamburger and also fan retention.
“I think we’re going to take it to the next level. It’s important to me here. This is new and this won’t be understood by all in the industry but what’s important to me is to combine a fan experience into motorsports.”
While early indications suggest Dominion Raceway will have a strong car count, Britt doesn’t feel car counts alone are what will fill the stands.
“I think a lot of people view this as kind of, you’ve got to have the car count to get the fans. I actually see it much differently than that,” Britt explained. “I think our mantra’s going to be really entertaining that fan and creating a great fanbase because, if you have a great fanbase, you’re going to be able to attract sponsors and if the racers can get sponsors, they’re going to come here and race, so there will be a lot of effort put into that fan experience.”
The facilities will feature everything from a videoboard, instead of the the standard scoreboards seen at most tracks, as well as a full service bar and restaurant, a pedestrian bridge and lounge areas. In contrast, Old Dominon Speedway, which opened in 1952 and ran through 2012, featured very few amenities even in contrast to many other short tracks in the region. The new facilities are all aimed at enhancing the fan experience.
“Quite honestly, the facility is designed around a fan experience,” Britt elaborated. “That whole building there is about the fan experience so I hope, if we get anything out of this, if anybody ever comes back and looks at this and goes ‘okay, this was very successful’, I hope they’ll take away the fact that we spent a lot of time and money making it fan friendly and getting the community involved and getting the sponsors involved and just putting the whole package together.
“I still believe that you’ve got to have your fanbase there to have your racer base,” Britt commented. “I don’t see it the opposite way. A lot of people do. They think you’ve got to have car counts to get your fans. Well, yes, there are fans who come because of the car count but the reality is, if you can get your fanbase and just show them a hell of a good time for a reasonable price, you’ll get your car count.”
One exciting aspects for pure race fans will be that the track is an oval track, a road course and a drag-strip and it will not be uncommon for two racing events to take place at the same time. However, running multiple racetracks and having other entertainment events at the speedway presents a challenge for any operator. Dominon Raceway general manager Edwin Pardue says making everything all work together will be his primary challenge.
“As you know, we’re adding the dragstrip late summer of 2016,” Pardue remarked. “So now you’ve got to take 365 days a year and four racetracks, because we’ll also have a concession karting program in the infield of the oval. We’re also doing drive-in movies, live music, eventually our second floor of the main building will turn into a full service full-time restaurant. So, it’s making all the pieces work together. Saturdays will be interesting here because you’ll have cars on the oval track getting ready for Saturday night racing and, at the same time, you might have the Porche Club of America on the road course doing their, whether it’s racing or it’s just their high performance driving. So it will be pretty fun. We did have, the other day, cars on the oval and a car testing on the road course at the same time. It was pretty cool.”
The modern facilities aren’t exclusive to the fan experience. Drivers themselves will get to experience state-of-the-art facilities in the pits as well.
“The track and having the amenities, we’ve got the infield pit building has very nice restrooms, two drive-thru bays for tires and inspection, a very nice concession area and even a small green room the driver can use as a changing room if they came in with truck and trailer,” Pardue said. “I think when they get here, the combination of the racing surface, the amenities and the people we have staffing the project, I think, more than anything else, that will drive our numbers.”
While car counts aren’t the main focus for Britt and Pardue, a healthy turnout for a ruls meeting, an open test in December and the number of drivers who have pre-registered numbers gives Pardue even more reason to be optimistic about the car counts.
“I think there were 17 or 18 Late Models here on test day but what gave us the real clue that we would do well in the car count area is when we did an open driver’s meeting,” Pardue explained. “Guys and girls started registering their numbers. We’re at over 250 I think on registered numbers. Now, we’re smart enough to know some of those people are just placeholders. We had people register numbers who don’t even have a car so we understand that’s just to hold a number and hope they get something put together. But that showed very well. The other thing, I think, with a new facility and a quality facility and bringing the right people here to run this thing, I think the interest level is high enough, you’ll get people here the first, second time and we need to put on a program that they’re happy with so they come back.”
In its final years of operation, Old Dominion Speedway, which was located in Manassas, Virginia, often saw a thousand spectators or more which Britt feels was good but not great and he feels facilities were a large part of that.
“I think Old Dominion had a better than average. It wasn’t a great fan count,” Britt stated. “We’re hoping to do a lot better but we didn’t have any of the things in place to entertain that fan. They came in, they sat on a wood bleacher, they watched the cars go around for a couple hours, it was well efficiently run, I don’t disagree, it was well officiated, all of that was true, but the new people are wanting to have like Wi-Fi in the stands. We bought a Wi-Fi system so you can be in the stands, connect to our Wi-Fi, don’t have to connect to your cellular, that was important. You’ve got to have a place for those fans to go to eat, travel around, get out of their seat, walk around some.”
Britt is also ambitious about the track’s videoboard which will be used for instant replays, live action as well as for other events such as concerts and drive-thru movies.
“That video screen is a big part of fan interaction so we can play clips from an accident, we can play clips from a fight, we can do all kinds of weird entertainment interaction, do a kissing camera and things like that. All of those things haven’t really been adopted yet in motorsports. It’s been adopted in college sports. It’s been adopted in some of the hockey sports and minor league baseball does this, does a great job of it. We’re going to bring it to motorsports because I still say, at the end of the day, the fan wants to be entertained and you can’t do that anymore watching the cars go around in circles for 200 laps. You’ve got to have more than that.”
Between the expectation of side-by-side racing and the amenities the track provides for fans, Dominion Raceway certainly promises to be the go-to destination for race fans in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic as well as for residents in Spotsylvania County, Virginia. The opening race will be held on Saturday, April 9th and racing will be held on Saturday nights all throughout the summer months.
