Racetracks hanging on

Sometimes addiction can be a good thing.

If not for the craving that often strikes race car drivers, the area racing landscape would likely be barren. The slumping economy and an extremely rainy spring season have hurt the Chattanooga area’s three dirt tracks.

But while Boyd’s, Cleveland and North Georgia speedways all have been affected, none is in danger of closing its gates thanks to the racing addiction that keeps drivers competing and fans coming out.

“Teams are racing smarter, but they’re still racing,” said Steve Hixson, a veteran racing promoter who is the public relations and marketing director at Boyd’s Speedway. “Once the guys get behind the wheel, they get hooked. The great majority of teams that race now on the local level are mom-and-pop operations where the dad has raced and now the kids are taking over. Racing is a family affair, and we’re glad it is.”

The Grays are one such family. Jimmy Gray raced for 30 years, and now son Lee is in the driver’s seat. Jimmy Gray co-owns North Georgia Motorsports, which sells racing parts, and he’s seen the highs and lows of area racing.

He’s concerned, both as a racing team and business owner, with the current state of the sport, but he believes the hard-core racers will keep it going even with sponsorship help increasingly hard to obtain.

“The big difference from when I competed is the racing is more competitive now,” Gray said. “Everybody’s got good stuff now. There’s no money in it, though, but it’s kind of like a drug: You get hooked on it. Most all the teams have cut back on account of the economy. A lot of people have slowed down, and the rain this year hasn’t helped either.”

Even more than the economy, the wet weather has played havoc with the tracks. Cleveland Speedway, for instance, has had one full Saturday night of racing in the past two months. If a track can’t open its gates, it can’t make any money.

“The weather is killing us,” said Monty Morrow, who co-owns the Cleveland track and also is the promoter at North Georgia Speedway in Chatsworth. “Last Saturday was the first time we’ve run a full schedule in a while, so we’re not sure how the economy is affecting us. We just don’t have a base to compare it to. When we have raced, the people have shown up.”

Boyd’s, which holds races on Friday nights, has had a little better luck with the weather with six full nights of racing since March. The track has had some good crowds, but the average attendance is well down from 2008, when it reopened to weekly sellouts.

“We are having a meeting soon to make some adjustments to the schedule because of the economy,” Hixson said. “Money is slow and we’re going to have to be smarter. We know if we open the gates, people will come. It’s just not as many as last year right now. We’re not in the business to not make money.”

To that end, Morrow has cut the schedule back at North Georgia from 20 race nights to 10 this year, hoping that several bigger events will draw better crowds than numerous smaller ones.

“We’re going to have our first race June 12 at North Georgia and we’re bringing in the Lucas Oil Series, which is the big boys of dirt racing,” said Morrow, who has not had to cut back at Cleveland. “Fans are having to be careful with their money, so we need to give them more of a reason to come to the races. We’re doing everything we can. We haven’t raised prices, so we’re more economically friendly than many things families can do together.”

Both Morrow and Hixson report that their car counts have been good. With many Southern tracks either closing down or cutting back, the more established teams are searching for places to compete.

“We’re drawing a lot of teams from Maryville (Tenn.) and the north Alabama area,” Hixson said. “Mostly these are teams with sponsorship, but even those teams are having to race smarter. For instance, the Hunt Trucking team has several established drivers like Jamie Perry of Ringgold and Todd Morrow of East Ridge, guys who know how to set the cars up and can take care of them. That cuts their expenditures down considerably.”

It also helps keep the tracks going when big-money teams rent them out for test sessions. Boyd’s recently had one such customer when NASCAR legend Bill Elliott wanted to give son Chase some track time in his Late Model car. The afternoon session gave Hixson a glimpse as to why dirt track racing isn’t going anywhere soon.

“Bill and his wife Cindy show up in an old truck and start unloading the car,” Hixson said. “Chase shows up an hour later, and they all work on the car together. Bill was in Charlotte that weekend, but he took the time to drive here so he could work with Chase.

“Bill Elliott has millions of dollars and he could hire people to work on the car, but he wants that grassroots feel to the racing. It’s the way he grew up and he wants that for his son, to keep it in the family. A lot of families are doing that, and that’s why this sport will make it through this.”