Colorado Springs International Speedway

The quarter-mile asphalt oval opened on Saturday, May 1, 1976, on 97 acres 1.5 miles east of Peterson Road on Highway 94. An eighth-mile drag strip was built a few hundred feet east of the oval, and both still show in aerial photos. Mike and Joe Bonicelli built and owned the track. The NHRA-sanctioned strip held its first race on Sunday, May 16, 1976, where Colorado drivers won match races against Bob Struknes of North Dakota and Ray Motes of Missouri. Tom Kaiser won top fuel and Art Ward funny car. A sparse crowd came to the second race to see Peggy Pierce’s Corvette BB/FC beat Glen Rowe’s AA/AD three straight times. In 1977 the strip became Colorado Springs International Dragway, with mostly night races plus the two-day first annual NHRA Eighth Mile Sportsman National Open on June 18-19. Big names booked that year included Shirley Muldowney, Tommy Ivo, Ray Beadle and the Hemi Under Glass wheelstander. 1979 brought sparse crowds and bad weather. A late afternoon thunderstorm held down attendance at the first annual Mello Yellow Nationals that June, with Don Garlits and Tom McEwen in the field, but Garlits still set an eighth-mile world record.

In 1982 promoter Glenn Johnson leased the place but ran only the oval, suspending drag racing. In 1983 Doyle Stogner, Bruce Betts and Bob Howard leased it from Joe Bonicelli, planning to let local racers organize the drags, and bracket racing came back that May after two years off. Drag racing on the strip ended in 1983, though mud drags were held beside it in 1984. All racing stopped when the property was sold to Tucson developer Frank Aries, who ended it. Remnants of the track are still there.