Greetings from Bradford, Vermont
From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
Bear Ridge Speedway Dirt oval Lifetime track #1,433 Reprinted with permission from my Saturday, May 23, 2009, Trackchaser Report. THE CLASSIC TRACKCHASER REPORT Significant note: Carol and I visited the Bear Ridge Speedway in 2009. However, I cannot find my Trackchaser Report notes from that trip. Therefore, Bear Ridge will follow the classic Trackchaser Report format. This is an odd situation that I can’t really explain! Editor’s note: This is a CLASSIC Trackchaser Report. What the heck does “Classic” mean? It’s simply a Trackchaser Report that comes from my trackchasing archives. Typically these will be stories from tracks I visited five years or ten years or more ago. For whatever reason (usually not enough time) this trackchasing adventure didn’t get posted to my website when I first made the track visit. Often a classic TR will not have a video and/or photo album attached. I didn’t begin producing my YouTube videos until 2009 (YouTube channel: RANLAY). I didn’t begin writing a complete Trackchaser Report until I had seen about 425 tracks. This was during the 2000 trackchasing season. Photo albums were sort of hit or miss during the early years of my trackchasing. Additionally, if you see a website link know that link worked when the TR was originally written. Will it work now? Your guess is as good as mine! Nevertheless, this CLASSIC Trackchaser Report has finally bubbled to the surface and is now available for everyone to see at www.randylewis.org. I hope you enjoy it. I AM A TRACKCHASER. My name is Randy Lewis. I hail from the sleepy little village by the sea, San Clemente, California. I am a “trackchaser”. I trackchase. Have you ever in your life heard of “trackchasing”? I didn’t think so. I live in southern California. That’s probably the most inconvenient location in the country for seeing tracks in the U.S. Most of the racetracks in the U.S. are located well over 1,000 miles from where I live. My average trip covers 5,000 miles and more. I take 35-40 of those trips each season. In any given year I will travel well over 200,000 miles, rent more than 50 cars, and stay in more than 150 hotel rooms. I get the chance to meet people from all over the world. With trackchasing trips to 85 countries and counting just getting the chance to experience so many unique cultures, spend time in the homes of my friends and meet so many people is a huge reward for being in this hobby. I am indebted to several of these folks for their help and friendship. Once you begin researching my trip itineraries from my website, yes you will want to do that, you will be surprised. One day I’ll be in Tucson, the next in maybe Tuscaloosa and the following day in Syracuse. I do that kind of thing all the time. Figuring out the logistics of a trip like that is as much fun for me as watching a figure 8 race. Now you know a little bit about my trackchasing addiction. When you receive one of my Trackchaser Reports or find one on my website at www.randylewis.org I hope you will take the time to imagine in your mind what it took to make this trip from SoCal and understand the fun I had doing it. There you have it. That’s trackchasing…the way I do it. Do others trackchase? Absolutely. Do they share their experiences? Sorry. They don’t. If you want to see the true “essence” of trackchasing you’ve come to the right place. Today’s adventure was one more of the 2,000 trips that have taken me up, down and around the proverbial long and dusty trackchasing trail. If you would like to see where I’ve been and experience those adventures here’s the link: If you’ve got a question, comment or whatever please leave it at the bottom of this report. It’s very easy to do. Or you can visit me on Facebook. Thanks! FOREWORD Saturday, May 23, 2009. From my very limited notes I know that Carol and I saw five feature events from the previous week’s rainout. I do have 61 photos from our visit. You won’t want to miss those. The Bear Ridge Speedway was the third track where I had seen racing in the Green Mountain State. The first two were the famous Thunder Road International Speedway and the Devil’s Bowl Speedway. This was Carol’s second trackchasing trip to Vermont after having visited Devil’s Bowl. From my photos I can discern this information. We drove past the Legion Speedway in New Hampshire on the way to the track. They don’t have “garage” sales in Vermont they are called “yard” sales. They sell a lot of maple syrup stuff up this way. The Bear Ridge Speedway’s catch phrase is “Home of the coupes”. I grew up with the coupes and love ‘em. We went to the track but we were early. That being the case we took a ride downtown checking out Hill’s 5 & 10 cent store. We had dinner at Chan’s House for Chinese Food. From the looks of my photos the food was fantastic! Soon we were back to the track and in a long line of spectators waiting to get in. Fans bought their tickets from inside their cars. The seating area offered somewhat traditional aluminum grandstands but with seat backs. I couldn’t recall seeing this particular setup anywhere else. A cheeseburger was priced at $4.50 and a hot dog was two bucks. Those seemed like high prices in 2009. As this is rewritten in 2022, I can pretty much find those prices at tracks today. My photo of the track’s concession menu was met with a frown from the server. Doesn’t she know that I have a responsibility to cover these tracks for my loyal readers? The pit area was rustic and filled with well-used generally low-dollar machines. The track offered up some black dirt that reminded me of racing in Iowa. The track was rough. A sign touted that in 2009 Bear Ridge was hosting its 42nd consecutive year of racing. The sign carried this message. “Bear Ridge Speedway where every lap is the last lap!” What the heck did that mean? Maybe they were saying that the last lap is always exciting so if every lap is like the last lap, then every lap is exciting! The did serve some delicious looking fried dough sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. The modified feature started 11 cars. The track is small and tight. Eleven cars were the perfect field for this race. This was late May but chilly. Fans watched the races wearing jackets. The four-cylinder division brought quite a few cars and put on a good race. The old-style coupes from decades ago had eight cars in their field and looked good. A good crowd was on hand for this early season (the month of May is early in Vermont) and was having a good time. After seeing five feature races from the previous week’s rained out program, we elected to spend the balance of our evening at the Riverside Speedway in Groveton, New Hampshire. The drive was a quick 70 miles into the Granite State. You might have remembrances about this track. If so, please feel free to share your memories in the comments section below. If you have any photos from back in the day, send them to me at Ranlay@yahoo.com. I’ll try to include them here. Thanks for reading about my trackchasing, Randy Lewis World’s #1 Trackchaser Peoria Old Timers Racing Club (P.O.R.C.) Hall of Fame Member That’s all folks! Official end of the RLR – Randy Lewis Racing Trackchaser Report Click on the link below for a photo album from today’s trackchasing day. You can view the album slide by slide or click on the “slide show” icon for a self-guided tour of today’s trackchasing adventure. Trackchasing from 2009 in the beautiful and rustic state of Vermont 
