The people of western New York come from hardy stock. The shrug at a couple feet of snow during the long, Great Lakes-aided winters, opting to down a few Labatt Blues and carry on with their day after stacking snow head-high. It’s probably no surprise then, that Ransomville Speedway near Niagara Falls hosts an annual race on New Year’s Day on their dirt oval called the Hangover 150. As it is winter in almost-Canada, that typically means the packed-dirt is covered with a layer of snow and ice. Add in the leftover mental haze from the previous night’s celebrations and a noon start for the three 50-lap races for four, six, and eight cylinders, and you’ve got the makings of an absurdly entertaining, frigid afternoon at the dirt oval.
There’s a certain amount of temptation to head up to Niagara Falls for New Year’s Eve, buy a cheap beater on CraigsList like this 237,000-mile Honda Accord, and take it racing the next day. What, as they say in the 24 Hours of LeMons, could possibly go wrong? Whihe we consider how we can work this scheme to go racing on New Year’s Day, Here’s a pretty good example of Hangover 150 with helmet cam footage from a non-SHO jellybean Ford Taurus in the 2015 six-cylinder race.
