Charlotte Motor Speedway

The front straight of this octagon-shaped speedway had two slight bends, which made drag racing on it interesting. A trial race on March 19, 1961 drew 3,800 spectators and 143 entries, enough interest for more. Jim Barbee of Concord was fastest that day at 118 MPH in his B gas dragster, and Dutch Snipes won top eliminator at 109 MPH in his Chrysler-powered 1927 Model T. The April 16 race paid $500 across four classes and top eliminator, and races ran every Sunday until May 7, when the track stopped to get ready for the World 600 on May 28. Weekly Sunday racing returned July 30, timed over a fifth-mile section of the front straight, with cash awards and free chicken dinners for spectators. The first races may have been on a curved quarter mile that was later shortened for safety, since newspapers gave the track record as 103.45 MPH by Dan Allison, well below the first meet’s speeds.

In 1964-65 races were timed over an eighth mile on the backstretch. A $5,000 Super Stock Bonanza on June 28, 1964 drew Huston Platt and Arnie Beswick. In June 1965 racing moved to the lighted backstretch at night, and Ronnie Sox won the first night race for factory cars at 118.43 MPH. Richard Petty, who had lost a match race to Beswick in April, was booked against Sox in a best-of-five in early July.

In 1971 the speedway leased the facility to another promoter, and drag racing moved to an eighth-mile stretch of pit road on the front straight, where it stayed through the 1970s. Tom Ferrell ran the NHRA-sanctioned Southern National Drag Championships there on October 30 and November 7, 1971, and Dale Creasy was quickest of eighteen funny cars at 4.95 and 168.85 MPH. In 1972 the speedway signed with IHRA for regular annual races. At the IHRA Southern Nationals on March 30, 1974, Dave Anderson ran 3.42 at 248 MPH in an exhibition in the “Pollution Packer” rocket dragster, then lost control at the far end. He and two mechanics working on cars there were killed and three others hurt. At the IHRA Dixie Classic on July 20-21, 1974, Don Garlits beat Tommy Ivo four times and set an eighth-mile world record of 4.08, and Gene Snow beat Billy Meyer for the funny car title. Roger Gustin set an eighth-mile world speed record of 198 MPH in his jet dragster at the TWB International Drag Racing Championships on October 30-31, 1976. On June 24-26, 1988, IHRA sanctioned a 25-year reunion of 1963 Super Stock racers, including Bill Jenkins, Don Nicholson and Sox & Martin, on an eighth mile of pit road off turn four. That was the last drag racing at the speedway until zMax Dragway opened in 2008.