Greetings from Rockford, Illinois
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From the travels and adventures of the “World’s #1 Trackchaser”
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Rockford Speedway
Asphalt oval
Lifetime track #6
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Rockford Speedway
Asphalt road course
Lifetime track #7
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Rockford Speedway
Asphalt figure 8 track
Lifetime track #540 credited retroactively near the end of the 2001 season.
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Rockford Speedway
Dirt oval
Lifetime track #2,238
Rockford Speedway is one of the tracks I visited before I began writing my Trackchaser Reports in mid-2000. That means that I have no written documentation of roughly the first 400 tracks that I saw. I didn’t start including pictures and then YouTube movies with my Trackchaser Reports until even later in my trackchasing career.
Nevertheless, I do remember a few things about my visits to the Rockford Speedway. I first went the speedway in about 1965 while I was still in high school. I didn’t start recording specific dates of my track visits until the 1981 season. Prior to ’81 I went to Rockford several times. Since 1981 and through the 2013 season I have recorded 23 trips to the famous Rockford Speedway.
Joe Shear
The Rockford Speedway was the first track where I ever saw racing on asphalt. The oval at Rockford is a tight little quarter-mile high-banked track that provides lots of racing action. When I first started going there one local driver was dominant. Of course, I’m talking about Joe Shear. Joe Shear always carried the #36. When I first started seeing him race he sported the most beautiful shiny black Chevy Chevelles I had ever seen. His cars were great looking and he won nearly every race against the weekly Rockford Speedway competition.
Dick Trickle
Back in those days the Rockford “Nationals” was a very big racing event. We went to that show several times. We often camped on the Rockford Speedway grounds. My most memorable “Nationals” was when Dick Trickle and Ramo Stott went door handle to door handle for the better part of 200 laps.
Huge Deery
Of course, no visit to Rockford Speedway would be complete without seeing legendary owner and promoter Huge Deery. This guy knew how to promote races and he didn’t take any guff from drivers or fans. I once saw him march into the grandstand and chastise a fan for their rowdy behavior.
Rockford had a beer garden at the track. Inside the beer garden were several photos of cars and drivers that had visited Rockford Speedway over the years. My all-time favorite driver, Darrell Dake, raced almost all the time on dirt tracks. However, a photo in the beer garden showed him racing at Rockford on asphalt. I never saw DD race at Rockford or on any asphalt track. However this photo shows Darrel Dake competing at Rockford in one of his famous Ford convertibles.
I never saw Darrell Dake race on asphalt, although I did see his picture on the photo wall inside the beer garden at the Rockford Speedway. This is Dake racing at Rockford in 1968. (Dennis Piefer photo)
You might have remembrances about the Rockford Speedway. If so, please feel free to share 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.