Byrd said that the feedback he’s gotten from Indianapolis-area race fans, even before the first race at Circle City, has been “overwhelmingly positive.”
“If everybody who has come up and told us things and said how, ‘You guys are going to be so successful,’ and all that sort of stuff, I just keep telling them from their lips to God’s ears,” Byrd explained. “I’m hoping that they’re all right about those thoughts. I feel like they will be. I think we’re going to get the support. I watched a lot of racing online last summer, with nothing else to do (during the COVID-19 pandemic) and nobody else doing anything else, and these races all across the country just had packed car counts. Most of them were huge.
“Dirt racing has probably been on the upswing for years, and that’s exploded in the past year where now, it’s as big as it has ever been, I feel like,” he said. “Maybe the pandemic helped with that, maybe it didn’t, but when there’s no concerts, there’s few professional sports, there’s no movies … there’s nothing you can spend your money on for live entertainment except short track racing across the country, and I think that’s a big part of the groundswell that we’ve seen over the past 12 months.
“For us to be doing what we’re doing in the middle of a metropolitan area, where it has the potential to reach a million people or more who are just 20 minutes’ drive away, I think we’re really set up for success.”
Byrd tipped that he’s hoping Circle City Raceway becomes for the Indianapolis area what the famed Eldora Speedway – Tony Stewart’s half-mile dirt track in Rossburg, Ohio – became for that part of the country.
He doesn’t want his venue to be “just another dirt track.” Byrd is aiming for a unique feel when it comes to Circle City’s allure and atmosphere.
“We’re setting our own pattern and making our own way, but our model is the Eldora model, where we’re a big-event race track that’s not necessarily weekly as much as it is running big events. Our fans, every time they come, they’re going to see something different,” Byrd said. “If they miss a week, they’re going to miss something. So they have to come every week, because it’s almost going to be different every time they’re #INtheDirt. I think that could be a fantastic X-factor for us, especially because we’re hardly running any Saturday nights. I think we’ve only got two or three weekend events planned.
“We’ll have all this extra racing, all happening on different nights, so fans can go to their local track and support them, and when they want to come and get an extra racing fix, Circle City Raceway will be there to supply that for them.”
Above all, Byrd is excited to once again weave his family’s racing history into the grassroots landscape, just like his late father – Jonathan Byrd Sr. – did by supporting short-track racers, such as Rich Vogler, John Andretti, Brian Tyler and J.J. Yeley, on their journeys up the motorsports ladder.
“Our family’s legacy goes all the way back to the early 1980’s at the Indianapolis Speedrome, and I got my love of racing through Figure-8 competition, but there was also the midget racing happening at the Speedrome that was the genesis of Thursday Night Thunder,” Byrd recalled. “That helped launch the careers of many, many drivers and exposed open-wheel USAC racing to a bigger audience. My dad won two national championships in USAC as a car owner, and seeing him go across the country to so many historic race tracks, like Terre Haute (Action Track) and Winchester (Speedway), Williams Grove (Speedway) and even Ascot Park (in California), was all really cool to me when I was younger.
“To be able to have a dirt track and meet the people and sanctioning bodies who I’ve seen on television from afar, and to be able to work with them and to see what they’re trying to do is something that I’m proud of and appreciative of the chance we have,” Byrd continued. “Stars of racing across the country will be traveling through Indianapolis to race at Circle City Raceway next year, and we’re all very excited about what’s going to happen and what we have the ability to hopefully build.
“It’s very special for me and for our family, and I’m so excited about getting started in May.”
Circle City Raceway will open for business on Thursday, May 20, with a twinbill program featuring the All Star Circuit of Champions sprint cars and TQ midgets.
For more information, visit circlecityraceway.com.