Dayton’s Hollywood Gaming hosts inaugural cruise-in

In the cold of winter, Dee Mara, marketing director at Hollywood Gaming at Dayton Raceway had a hot idea: Host a car show at the facility in the spring.

“I wanted to do something to introduce our facility to another group, and we have plenty of parking spaces,” she explained. “I thought a Sunday might be good. The racino is not real crowded then and our north lot has over 400 parking spaces.”

Her idea came to fruition the third Sunday in April, and to call it a success is a gross understatement.

“We hoped for about 400 cars,” Mara said as she walked the lot. “We planned to start registration at 10 a.m., and luckily we were ahead of schedule because cars began arriving at 8:30. There’s over 300 here right now and it’s not even 11 a.m.”

Mara and Hollywood Gaming wanted to keep things simple, but also wanted to ensure the participants had a good time and a reason to bring out their cars. Not only did they hire Ashley Martin and her band to perform, they also had a $10 dining coupon for each entrant.

The cars were judged in five classes. The winner in each class got a nice trophy and $250 in cash.

“There was a wide assortment, primarily domestic hot rods and classics making up most of the entries, “explained George Thielen, one of three local experts picked to judge the cars. “There were lots of older restorations with enough patina to indicate that the owners were clearly not afraid to drive their creations, accompanied by some fresh restorations,” he added. “It was also reassuring to see a large number of newer cars that have been customized and modified ensuring the car hobby won’t be limited to us old timers.”

When it was all said and done, it took the judges most of the afternoon to determine the five winners from over 500 cars in attendance. First place awards were given to: Modern Car, Craig Shockey, Camaro; Street/Hot Rod, Jim Wilkins, ’67 Nova; Truck or Pickup, Ken Faust, ’41 Dodge; Sports Car, Norm Oldham,’79 Corvette; Antique/Classic, Joe Peters , ’71 Chevelle

Rob Schrader of the Miami Valley Novas said, “The cars, trucks and motorcycles just kept on coming and coming at both ends of the north parking lot, until they had 508 entries. There were so many cool rides that it was virtually impossible to not find something interesting to look at. And since there was no entry fee, the rides kept on coming even after registration closed at 2 p.m. We had 24 MVN members show up with their cars.”

“We are incredibly excited at the community’s response to our first-ever cruise-in event,” said Jason Birney, vice president and general manager of Hollywood Gaming. “We were able to showcase over 500 cars on a beautiful afternoon while enjoying food and entertainment with members of our community.

“I want to give a special thank-you to Phil Parker, president and CEO of the Dayton Area Chamber of Commerce, for his guidance in helping our team execute such a successful event,” he continued. “You can expect more car enthusiast activities at Hollywood Gaming at Dayton Raceway in the future.”

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