SOUTH BOSTON, VA :: South Boston Speedway General Manager Cathy Rice is optimistic and excited about the upcoming racing season. Rice feels schedules at nearby tracks and an overall cooperation between all the regional tracks will result in higher car counts and a better racing experience for fans and drivers alike.
Most notably, Rice points to the reduced schedule at Motor Mile Speedway as something that could result in higher car counts for the Halifax County based South Boston Speedway.
“We’re excited we’re all pumped up,” Rice said. “Motor Mile only has six races and they’re not conflicting with us so we draw from them as well as Langley and Southern National. We draw from each other. We really try to work together, that’s what it’s all about. We’re all one big team and we want to make it affordable for the competitors and the fans and we work hard to do that.”
Rice is optimistic about car counts improving in the 2013 season.
“We’re looking forward to this year,” Rice remarked. “We think it will be a great year. I keep hearing good things about car counts. We had 13 Limited Late Models show up for practice. Track conditions were not favorable and the weather wasn’t that good but we had that many cars show up. We also had 10-11 Late Models here. That’s looking good. Philip Morris was here testing (Tuesday). Nine or ten cars will be here on the day on Friday and more might show up for the open practice at night. We’ve also added a couple of races and we’re starting early. It can be a good thing or it can be a bad thing. We’re eager to get started and we wanted to race. I really think that you’re going to see an increase in our car counts because of scheduling at other tracks.”
Rice also talked about the level of competition at the track.
“We pull from them and they pull from us,” Rice continued. “I’m partial to South Boston; I’ve been here for many years. We’re a premiere track, the competition here is unbelievable. You’ve got national champions that will be competing with Philip Morris, Lee Pulliam and Peyton Sellers. I remember way back, people would say, ‘Cathy you’re not going to have a national champion because it’s too hard to win there and too hard to get a Nat’l Champion out of South Boston’. We’ve proved that wrong.”
Rice also spoke about the way South Boston is seeking to improve the fan experience.
“This year’s going to be great,” Rice stated. “Fan wise, our fans were good last year, they’ll be better this year. We’ve kept our prices affordable, $10 to get in. You can’t beat that.”
The first race of the season, on March 9th, will feature the two most recent NASCAR Whelen All American Series National Champions. Rice talked about the talent of the drivers who compete at South Boston.
“We are excited about Philip and Lee,” Rice explained. “Not just those two but others like Matt Bowling, Sellers and Austin Thaxton. All of those guys, any given night, you can have a different winner. I’ve told people so many times that the guys that race here and have the talent, they should be in touring divisions like NASCAR. It’s a shame they aren’t because they’ve got the talent.
“I’m excited about the competition we have coming this year,” Rice asserted. “I just hope it will be good racing for our fans. That’s what it’s about. We have to put on a show for our fans. You have to have fans and racers. What we’ve done this year, we’ve increased out late model purse a little bit. With Pocono being our sister track, that’s a big plus for us as well. The Matiolis have been wonderful people. I’ve been here for many years and hope to stay for many years to give racers a place to race.”
Rice says the track has an internal motto: Convenient, friendly and fun.
One of the most noticeable things in the 2013 South Boston Speedway schedule was the exclusion of the South Boston 300.
“We’re not going to run the South Boston 300,” Rice said. “We’ll run the July 3rd race and open up with the Twin 100s which will pay the same as the 200 lap race in July, split down the middle. We’ve seen that we didn’t get the support we needed. Last year, we tried it at the beginning of the year and only got 18 cars. To pay $10,000 to win and only have 18 cars is not a big race. I’m not saying we won’t have it ever again but we won’t have it this year.”
Rice also spoke about the support divisions at South Boston Speedway, how she expects field in those divisions to grow and the drivers that run in those divisions.
“We’ve got Bobby McCarty, he’s moved up to Late Models,” Rice explained. “We’ve got new people coming. Libby Privette is running Limited this year. We’ve got some new ones coming on board this year. I saw Limited drivers from Motor Mile that plan to race with us occasionally. We’re excited about that. We’ve also got the SK-type Modifieds racing six times. We’re excited about working with Bill Mullis at Langley Speedway on that. I don’t want to leave out pure stocks either. The Pure Stock class is inexpensive. If you want to get started in racing, I encourage you to run the Pure Stock division. It’s fun and affordable. We try to make it affordable. We can’t spend money for them but we try to make it something for them.”
Rice is also excited about the Virginia Triple Crown coming back to South Boston Speedway, Langley Speedway and Martinsville Speedway.
“I don’t want to forget the Triple Crown again,” Rice remarked. “It will be crowned at Martinsville. The three tracks are South Boston, Langley and Martinsville. That will consist of our July 3rd race, the Hampton Heat 200 and the Martinsville race. CE Falk won it last year.”
The first race of the season, on Saturday, will be a daytime race as is tradition for South Boston. Once April comes, the races will begin to be run in primetime.
“For March, we start out with day races and go to night races in April,” Rice explained. “If the weather is pretty and it’s warm enough that you can sit out there for a couple hours, I would think we can get 4,000-5,000 people here on Saturday. We’ve had that kind of crowd in the past. That’s what I’d like to see – and a good field of cars to put on a show.”
The first race of South Boston Speedway 2013 South Boston Speedway schedule will be on Saturday, March 9th with the green flag waving on twin 100 lap Late Model events waving at 2pm. The Limited Late Model division and the Pure Stock division will also race on Saturday.
