Forum: Oklahomatidbits.com General Forum (go)
Moderators:  /  David Smith Jr

I have been going to Deatherages OKC trade show for several years, as has alot of you, and I could just sense a different atmosphere while I was there today. "It is like people were kicked in the balls," was one persons take and I think pretty well nailed it on the head. I asked Deatherage how this years was and he informed "down a bit but we are all right." The show is already scheduled for next year with dates I will give when I update tomorrow.

I do not think people outside the racing community get the gest of how we are feeling or what it is like. As Kenny (the Butler) and I talked, Fairgrounds Speedway was much more than a racing venue, it was a meeting place, a social area, where fans and non fans went to hang out on Friday nights. You don't want to be stuck indoors when the weather is nice. Teenagers like fast cars and to check out the girls and the track had it all. Racing, wrecks, women, free beer after the races if you knew the right drivers, hate and discontent - you had it all and it was for everybody.

Many friends were made and even some relationships. But outside the racing community, nobody seems to understand and now that it all seems to be gone, I think that is what is now hurting me the most right at the moment. Yes, I haven't been there as often on Friday nights the past couple of years as I have been chasing NCRA in Nebraska, Kansas and other places in Oklahoma but when in town on Friday nights, the wife didn't have to ask where I would be.

As a fan, it is now really starting to hurt as that is where I found dirt track racing and fell in love. I have NO idea how you second, third and fourth generation people feel as you all have true history there at that track. The Jennings', Reeds, Shouse, Wood, Leep, Buntins, Allens, the list goes on and on of you racing familys who helped build what Fairgrounds Speedway always has been and no matter what they do, always will be.

What am I trying to say? To hell if I know. The only thing I do know is that a big void has been left with an average of 4000 people on any given Friday night and the impact is something that the average Mick will never be able to understand. The city has offered everything at the track for a new one out at I-40 and Cimmaron Rd. for a city owned facility. How sweet of them, but if it ever is built it will never come close to Friday night racing at Fairgrounds Speedway in Oklahoma City.

And you can take this State Fair Speedway named crap and shove it up your a>, as it will always be Fairgrounds Speedway to those of us older people.

Sorry, feel a bit better now and I am not even having one of Unclea or Neighbors special drinks at the moment.

David Smith Jr.
www.oklahomatidbits.com

David, I was kinda worried about how we would do today with the petitions and such. We had around 400 signatures and had very positive response toward the Rally on the 30th.

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands 
in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he 
stands at times of challenge and controversy." 
Martin Luther King, Jr. 

Erich Petersen 

Well said David.