Just a couple of hours ago, the East Coast Timing Association was given permission to hold land speed racing events at the Wilmington Air Park in Wilmington, Ohio for the 2012 season. This includes the Hot Rod Magazine Top Speed Challenge. The group has been looking for a new home since the place they have raced at for a decade and a half at the Laurinburg-Maxton Airport in North Carolina decided not to renew their agreement for 2012. While it is sad to see a long standing venue close, it is uber exciting to see a new one open! This facility promises to have a far smoother racing surface than the famously rustic one in Maxton and it is located more centrally in the country so it may draw more competitors.
Joe and Donna Timney, along with Keith and Tonya Turk have been working tirelessly since they knew the Maxton deal was done earlier this year. In a conversation with Keith Turk last night, he was very excited at their prospects and thought today’s meeting with the officials that oversee the Air Park would go well. He reported that the house was packed and while the vote was not unanimous, there was a very strong majoirty who voted in favor of the ECTA using the Wilmington Air Park for their 2012 season (and hopefully many, many more to come!).
We’ll have more to share on this story in the days to come, but for the time being we wanted to send out a hearty BangShift congrats to the management and racers of the ECTA!
I’ll be happy to see an event here, especially since the facility is within 2 hours of my home. I’m really looking forward to this!
Nice. No dogleg to contend with, and fewer trees to hit if one goes offcourse.
Plus it’s closer to Kansas, so I might actually try to attend.
YES!!!!!!!
ECTA-Thank You for the hard work put forth
This is a good thing for us. As I said earlier, it’s longer tow for me and puts mountains between me and the track but it’ll be OK. The track is supposed to be WAY better than what we had and that’s super cool.
I haven’t heard any details on track length, shutdown area, staging, etc. but I know Keith and Joe wouldn’t have picked it if it wasn’t a good fit for us.
HUGE thanks to the Turks and Timneys. I know they put HUGE effort into making this happen.
I’ll be there
Dan
The runway is 9k’ and thanks to Turk and the others to bring this into our backyard!
Thsi is a great story and testament to Tonya, Keith and Joe and all those who worked so jard to get it done