Richmond International Raceway

THE EVENT

My one and only visit to the Richmond International Raceway….so far.

Over the weekend of September 6/7, 1991 I visited the Richmond International Raceway. RIR was my 196^th lifetime track. I had the pleasure of my stepfather Bill Virt and good friend and racing buddy Jim Sabo joining me on the trip. The three of us and sometimes my mom made several racing trips all over the east and Midwest.

Back in 1991 I wasn’t spending virtually any time with trackchasing. I was a “racechaser”. I went to the races for just one thing…..the see the best guys race at a competitive track.

Later I would change over to “trackchasing”. As a trackchaser I was nearly 100% focused on adding a new track. I didn’t much care what or who was racing. I would love to see good racing as a trackchaser. However, it doesn’t really matter. My goal as a trackchaser is to simply add another track to the list.

What does that mean? This is what it means. A very well-run track, that I’ve been too before, might be racing my favorite class of cars and stars just 100 miles north of me. Then a very poorly run operation, at a track I have never visited, might be racing my least favorite type of racing just 100 miles to the south of my location. Where will I go? As a trackchaser I will head south! The “track” is the name of the game in trackchasing. You won’t hear any other trackchaser explain the situation this way. They never had. However, for the leading trackchasers this is the thought process.

It seems as if I have been to Richmond many more times than just one weekend. That’s probably the case because I have WANTED to go to Richmond many times in the past. For years, when I was going to the World 100 at Eldora, Richmond was racing on the same weekend. I’ve been to the World 100 more than 10 times. Most of the top 10 trackchasers have NEVER been to the World 100. If that doesn’t prove the accuracy of the above paragraph I don’t know what does.

On our Richmond weekend in 1991 Bill and I saw Harry Gant win the Grand National race on Friday. Then Jim joined us on Saturday to see “Handsome Harry” win the Winston Cup race on Saturday night. I consider Richmond one of my top NASCAR tracks even though I have only been there to see racing on one weekend. A few years ago I did stop by RIR on a Cup weekend to see what things looked like. Then I motored on past for a trackchasing effort that I have long ago forgot about.

The traffic getting in and out of a big NASCAR race can be rough. We always planned ahead and cooked out while we waited for the traffic to clear. Those were fun times.

I didn’t begin writing my famous Trackchaser Reports until I had seen about 430 tracks. The above notes are from memory, recorded notes and photographs.

You might have remembrances about the Richmond International Raceway.  If so, please feel free to share in the comments section below.  If you have any photos from back in the day, please consider sending them to me at Ranlay@yahoo.com.  I’ll try to include them here.

Virginia

The Old Dominion state

This weekend I saw my 2nd lifetime track in the Old Dominion state, yes the Old Dominion state. My first ever track to see in Virginia was the Martinsville Speedway. These first two tracks to be seen in Virginia were part of “racechasing” efforts and not at all about “trackchasing”.