Full Throttle

Standby for the relatively small but vocal “NASCAR is discarding its roots” crowd to come out swinging as Speedway Motorsports Inc. announced plans to auction North Carolina Motor Speedway to the highest bidder.

Rockingham “The Little Speedway That Could,”… but finally couldn’t after decades of operation. Saddled with an inability to upgrade the facilities, a location in the middle of nowhere and virtually no infrastructure in the surrounding area to support “The Big League” the track was doomed for the dustbin of history.

North Carolina Motor Speedway was built in 1965 as a flat oval. The track was rebuilt in 1969 into the current banked oval. In 1997, NCMS merged with Penske Motorsports, and was renamed North Carolina Speedway. Penske subsequently sold his speedway operations to International Speedway Corporation.

Speedway Motorsports bought the track from ISC in 2004 then moved the Nextel Cup race to Texas Motor Speedway as a result of a lawsuit by owners of TMS involving NASCAR, ISC, and shareholders in Speedway Motorsports.

Rick Sago, director of Richmond County Development, is optimistic that racing can continue at the track in some form, but he said that depends on who buys it.

Keep dreamin’ Sago, my bet is the property will be sold to a large agricultural or home furnishing outfit and eventually used as a warehouse and transshipment point for the related industry in the area.

The most interesting thing to me will be the final selling price. Potential suiters for both The Rock and North Wilkesboro have claimed asking prices have been too high and have prevented those wishing to resurrect them to their former glory.

We’ll see what the actual value is now with an auction scheduled.