Kearney Dragway/Raceway Park
ActiveActive Still racing today.
Also known as Kearney Raceway Park
Kearney Raceway Park ended its 2026 season September 13 for a new racing surface, canceling the planned October 24 National Open.
- Jerry Wilson set a track record of 8.04 at 200 MPH on September 12, 1965
- Raced
- 1963-present
- State
- Nebraska
- Raced on
- A military airfield
- First race
- 1963 or 1964
- Sanction
- NHRA Division 5
- Track
- 1/4 mile
- Surface
- Runway
- Address
- Kearney, NE
- People
- Carroll Sheldon, founder and strip manager (1963 or 1964 to at least 1976)
- Elevation
- 2,122 ft (647 m)
- Coordinates
- 40.73327, -98.99785
Big races
Buick Olds Pontiac Heartland Nationals
A Buick, Olds and Pontiac race weekend with a Cruise and Lose drag-and-drive.
Midwest Stick Shift Nationals
A manual-transmission race with wheelie and burnout contests, in its second year in 2026.
NHRA Summit points races and gamblers races
Ten NHRA Summit points races plus small tire, index and bracket gamblers races; also hosts a Rocky Mountain Race Week stop and the Nebraska Diesel Show.
Rocky Mountain Race Week
A drag-and-drive: racers drive their street cars from track to track over several days and race at each stop.
Cruise and Lose
A drag-and-drive: racers drive their street cars from track to track over several days and race at each stop.
Race Week
A drag-and-drive: racers drive their street cars from track to track over several days and race at each stop.
Rocky Mountain Race Week 1.0
A drag-and-drive: racers drive their street cars from track to track over several days and race at each stop.
History
Carroll Sheldon began holding drag races on a runway at the old Kearney Army Air Field in 1964, though a 1976 news story called that year the 13th season of racing in Kearney, which would put the first in 1963. Sheldon was still managing the strip in 1976. At the last race of 1965, on September 12, Jerry Wilson of Denver set a track record of 8.04 seconds at 200 MPH in his AA/FD. Kurt Behlen of Columbus won top eliminator on June 12, 1966 in his B/FX ‘66 Chevy II. Hot Rod listed Kearney Dragway as NHRA sanctioned in April 1968. It became Kearney Raceway Park in 1995.
Background
Kearney Regional Airport, formerly Kearney Municipal Airport, is five miles northeast of town in Buffalo County. It sees a modest amount of airline traffic, roughly 10,000 to 12,000 passenger boardings a year in 2008 through 2010.
Video
More in Nebraska
- Nothing left No longer racing, and nothing of the track remains. Cornhusker Raceway Park 1969-73
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Flightland/Omaha Dragway (Irvington) 1955, 1960-69
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Grand Island Airport 1957-65
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Lincoln Air Force Base 1957-66
- Status unknown Closed, but nobody has checked how much of the site survives, or the exact spot was never found. Lincoln Drag Strip 1968
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Sandhill Dragway (Ainsworth) 1965-68
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Scottsbluff Drag Strip 1958-68
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Scribner Air Base/Scribner Raceway/Nebraska Motorplex 1954, 1980-2005
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Unnamed drag strip (Auburn) 1956
- Status unknown Closed, but nobody has checked how much of the site survives, or the exact spot was never found. Unnamed drag strip (Brainard) 1963-68
- Nothing left No longer racing, and nothing of the track remains. Unnamed drag strip (Falls City) 1956-58
- Status unknown Closed, but nobody has checked how much of the site survives, or the exact spot was never found. Unnamed drag strip (Lincoln) 1956