But don’t think of it as NASCAR returning to Eldora. Think of it as Eldora returning NASCAR to its roots.
The MudSummer Classic remains NASCAR’s lone dirt race among its three national series — Sprint Cup, Xfinity Series and Camping World Truck Series. And Eldora treats the visit like it would the Dirt Late Model Dream, Kings Royal, World 100 or 4-Crown Nationals.
It’s NASCAR pulling off a four-wide salute on the parade lap. It’s heat races and last-chance features. And it’s a high school band playing the national anthem.
“The St. Henry band doing the anthem is one of the highlights for me,” said Eldora general manager Roger Slack. “There are country music artists that want to do it. I think the whole spirit of that event is captured in this fantastic local high school band doing the national anthem. It’s a little reminder to everybody that no matter how big NASCAR has gotten, we all need to remember our roots.”
The sport got its start from bootleggers outrunning the law on dirt roads down south who eventually decided to go racin’. Prior to Eldora, NASCAR’s last race on dirt was at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds in Raleigh, N.C., on Sept. 30, 1970.
The third MudSummer Classic runs Wednesday (9 p.m., FoxSports1, MRN radio). Austin Dillon won the inaugural race in 2013 and Darrell Wallace Jr. earned the gold shovel trophy last year.
Dillon returns this season and is joined by fellow Sprint Cup driver Brad Keselowski among the big names.
Tony Stewart will also be there. The Eldora Speedway owner is in the middle of a hectic two weeks. After hosting the Truck Series at the beginning of the week he’s off to Indianapolis for the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
And don’t forget that Eldora Speedway hosted the Kings Royal on Friday and Saturday, the highest-paying winged sprint car race in the country at $50,000 to win.
It’s that turnaround of clearing out about 20,000 fans — and the trash and cans they’ve left scattered around the track and in the campgrounds — in time to let NASCAR do its thing that nearly left Eldora off the Truck Series schedule.
Slack said it came down to a vote of Eldora’s core group of eight employees of whether they could pull off the daunting task of hosting two major events in six days. They welcomed the challenge.
“It’s definitely something we are proud off. Not being from this area — I grew up in Canada, I lived and worked for 12 years in Charlotte and I worked practically as a suitcase promoter and traveled for three years — it’s aslo a testament to the people of the region,” Slack said. “They are the best in the country. There’s no other place in the country that would have been able to pull it off. It goes to the pedigree of the people.”
And that Eldora work ethic all started with Baltes. Few promoters, if any, were better at creating and pulling off a major event. It’s that tradition Stewart wants to continue.
“I’m a race fan, too. If I go there and the show runs smooth, watch a good race, then you see people when they’re leaving, they’re smiling, they’re talking about what they saw, you know, that makes all that worthwhile,” Stewart said.
“A lot of it is you got to be passionate about it. You’ve got to love what you’re doing. I love dirt track racing. Always have, always will. I love Eldora Speedway. That’s what I’m meant to do.”
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