Polar Raceway/Alaska Raceway Park (Palmer)

History

A points championship drag race was set for July 4, 1963, in Palmer, likely at the municipal airport east of town, with trophies for class winners. It was Alaska’s first points race that year, and the season finale was scheduled there for September 1, 1963. Local racers hoped to build a drag strip someday, plus an oval and a sports car road course. Harold Forslund acted on that and started leveling land north of the Knik River, which Lee Nelson leased for the raceway. Governor Bill Egan cut the ribbon when the track opened on Labor Day 1964. From then on, the Memorial Day race at Palmer was considered Alaska’s big drag race, with the race at Tanacross treated as a warm-up.

It was still Polar Raceway in 1971, when a race ran on October 3. Over the years it has also been called Thunder Valley Raceway, Valley Raceway and Big Valley Raceway. The Nelsons owned the track until about 1994, and Earl and Karen Lackey took over after that. In November 1994 a group of business people who loved motorsports bought the racing operation from Lee Nelson, incorporated it as Top End, Inc., and renamed it Alaska Raceway Park. It became an IHRA member track in 1995, was repaved with a heated launch pad in 2000, and switched from IHRA to NHRA in 2019.