Roswell Dragway
ClosedClosed No longer racing, but some of the track is still there.
Also known as Roswell Boys Club Dragway; Pecos Valley Raceway
- Proceeds went to Boys Club programs
- Operator Rick Callaway moved to the Roswell Industrial Air Center in 1995, now Area 51 Dragway
- Raced
- 1969-92, 1994-96
- State
- New Mexico
- What's left
- A good length of the old track surface is still there, in poor to good condition.
- Raced on
- An airport runway
- First race
- 1959
- Last race
- 1995
- Track
- 1/4 mile, later 1/8 mile
- Surface
- Runway
- Location
- Runway at the old Roswell Municipal Airport, northwest side of town
- People
- Chuck Rodery, track director (ca. 1970)
- Al Corzine, assistant (ca. 1970)
- Boys Club Timing Association, race operator
- Rick Callaway, operator (ca. 1985-95)
- Sanction
- AHRA, NHRA
- Elevation
- 3,620 ft (1,103 m)
- Coordinates
- 33.41024, -104.54987
Races ran on a runway of the Roswell Municipal Airport, on the northwest edge of town. The military took over the airport during World War II, and it went back to civilian use afterward. The airport closed in 1975, but drag racing there began in 1959, when the track was known as the Roswell Boys Club Dragway. Chuck Rodery was track director, with Al Corzine assisting. One of the first meets of 1970 was on Sunday, April 19, under NHRA sanction. The Boys Club Timing Association ran the races, and money above expenses went to Boys Club programs. It was Pecos Valley Raceway in 1983. The track stayed with NHRA until 1991, then switched to AHRA. Racing stopped in 1993, and when it came back the quarter-mile track had become an eighth-mile. Rick Callaway ran the strip at the old airport for ten years, until 1995, when the New Mexico Military Institute Foundation wouldn’t renew the lease on extra land the strip had been using. That year the city council let him race on a runway at the old Roswell Industrial Air Center, seven miles south of town, which operates today as Area 51 Dragway.
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