The good news from the world of drag strips across the United States keeps on rolling as a major announcement was made regarding the leadership at Heartland Park Topeka yesterday. Scott and Laura Garnder have been named as President/General Manager and Director of Business Operations at the facility. These two have been in the drag strip operations game for a very long time and as many of you know, Gardner was the President of the IHRA until several weeks ago when sweeping management and directional changes were made at that company. The couple’s successful stewardship of places like Cordova and other tracks makes us excited at the prospect of what they can do with what has been a slumbering giant in Heartland Park. The place is bad fast but unfortunately up until this year the management has just been bad.

During the 2015 season literally the only event that happened at Heartland Park was the NHRA Kansas Nationals and while that will likely be the biggest event on the 2016 schedule there is a lot more stuff planned, particularly weekly racing programs and events to get the local populous back into “race mode”. While Scott and Laura have a big job ahead of them we’re guessing that they are seeing it with a sense of excitement. This is the largest (both in physical size and in public profile) facility that the pair have operated and it will be interesting to see what types of programs they institute as their move into their tenure in these positions.

While there is never any sort of success guarantee when it comes to jobs and tasks like these, we think that Scott and Laura certainly bring a level of experience, professionalism, and know-how that previous operators seriously lacked. We’ll be at the Kansas Nationals in May…you should be too!

Click here to read the full story on Scott and Laura Gardner’s hiring at Topeka!