Holtville Airstrip

During World War II the Navy built an auxiliary air station five miles east of Holtville, with two 6,000-foot concrete runways. Imperial Valley’s Carrot Carnival, or Carrot Festival, started in 1948 as a modest event in the Holtville park. Newspapers said go-kart, sports car and drag races began in 1962, but Teddy Edwards said the first race was in 1955, NHRA sanction didn’t come until sometime in 1956, and they held one race a month from September to April. According to Edwards, the Imperial Valley Timing Association ran the races from 1962 to 1974 on the east-west runway, usually on the second or third Sunday of the month in the early years. The first Carrot Carnival drag race was on February 16, 1958, when the Speed Sport A/MR tied the track record of 155.17 mph set earlier by Cook & Bedwell. Three thousand spectators watched the second annual Carrot Championship on February 22, 1959, where Ted Cyr took top fuel eliminator, Jim Nelson took top gas eliminator in the Martin & Nelson Dragmaster, and Gary Cagle ran the top speed of 174.75 mph. At the Carrot Carnival races on April 9, 1972, Jon Giardina, 30, of Bellflower, was killed driving his 1970 Barracuda funny car. By 1980 it was called Holtville Aerodome Raceway, with some races run by the Yuma Drag Racing Association. Old-timers remember that racing eventually ran every weekend outside the hot summer months as well as at festival time, with as many as 200 cars at an event. The track surface was quite rough.