Maple Grove- IHRA (7 Viewers)

[65 Goatboy]

My first Nhra national event in the early 90's, the Goody's Midwest Nationals. I believe Gateway in St. Louis was not a Nhra national event track yet.

 

[z28]

I'm surprised there would be anything left of that track for IHRA to buy. It's been quite a few years since the last NHRA national event there.

Clay did a video there awhile back. It looks like not much changed

 

[tb]

My first Nhra national event in the early 90's, the Goody's Midwest Nationals. I believe Gateway in St. Louis was not a Nhra national event track yet.

Gateway was is AHRA track up until new owners in 1985, then went to IHRA. It became an NHRA track when Chris Pook rebuilt the whole facility in 1997, and has been since then. It is now owned by Curtis Francois.

 

[Joe]

Clay did a video there awhile back. It looks like not much changed

Clay was there when I rode with Larry Dixon in April of 21. An added bonus. His sister also.

 

[jgrigz]

From the videos I’ve seen recently it doesn’t look like anything is salvageable from the past. It’s going to probably be like Dragway 42 and US 131 and rebuilt from the ground up. It will be the same for Atlanta if that deal goes through.

 

[yoda]

The nice part is it's only 4hrs from Indy, so the teams for once will be saving $$$. On travel expenses

Meanwhile, the NJ/NY/PA market is now entirely chopped out of the schedule... LV is one race (which may not be a bad thing). No CO.
A serious question: Where does NHRA want to have its strongest market representation? In the past, TX, NE and PA have had truly done well as far as attendance. If GA was a winner, any smart organization would have been making moves to never lose the market.

Back to back to back races in the Rust Belt Midwest are ballsy; it'll be interesting to watch especially as the IHRA core location is in the same region as well as the SE.
BRING ON 2026, and let the gladiators get in the arena- only the strong survive.