Riverside Drag Strip (Hopkinsville)
ClosedClosed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there.
- A 1957 grand jury probe, ordered by a judge who saw it as a bad influence, brought no charges
- A pilot landed on the unlit strip in 1960, mistaking it for Outlaw Field in Clarksville
- Raced
- 1957-60
- State
- Kentucky
- What's left
- A good length of the old track surface is still there, in poor to good condition.
- On the site today
- Hopkinsville Christian County Airport (likely site)
- Raced on
- An airport runway
- Location
- Likely the airport two miles east of Hopkinsville
- Elevation
- 521 ft (159 m)
- Coordinates
- 36.85585, -87.45479
This strip was running by 1957, and possibly earlier. In September 1957, Circuit Judge Ira Smith told the Christian County grand jury to look into it, since he thought it was a bad influence on the county’s young people. The grand jury brought no charges. A mid-April 1958 ad in a Tennessee newspaper promised races every Sunday except when Sturgis was running, with no registration, classes or trophies, anyone welcome and plenty of grudge races, which points to a bare-bones operation. On May 29, 1960, newspapers reported that a pilot had landed by mistake on an unlit drag strip near Hopkinsville, thinking it was Outlaw Field in Clarksville, Tennessee. The races were likely held at what is now Hopkinsville Christian County Airport, built in 1952 two miles east of town.
More in Kentucky
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- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Campbell Air Force Base 1957
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- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Central Kentucky Drag Strip/Campbellsville Dragway 1959-66
- Closed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there. Kentucky Dam State Park Airport (Gilbertsville) 1957
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