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Some St. Louis News with Chris Blair · Midwest Racing Central Today

• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, everybody.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to this week's edition of Midwest Racing Central.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Today I'm Pete Pistoni.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Lots going on down near the St.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: Louis area, Worldwide Technology Raceway, plus some short track discussion as well.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: Let's bring in from Worldwide Technology Raceway Chris Blair with us at Midwest Racing Central today.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: Chris, how are you?
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, I'm doing great.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's race week, so you can't be any better than that.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we appreciate it.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: As I was joking with you before you came on with us, nothing else going on this week for you, so we appreciate you giving us uh some time.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Let's start uh with the weekend.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh lots going on with the O'Reilly Auto Park series on Saturday night, cup race on Sunday, but that's just sort of the tip of the iceberg.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: What's in store for race fans this weekend, Chris?
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I always like to say we're not your normal racetrack, and we try to be uh make sure that it's never just a normal race.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: We try to create a full event with our confluence music festival and just everything that we have going on.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: So with the full concert lineup, uh uh, you know, who would ever think you'd see the yin-yang twins and Buster Rums at a race on Saturday and then Sunday night wrapping it up with the old Dominion?
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: We have Chris Jansen still all lefty.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Have you know some great lineups there?
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, so they have that going on, plus the circus atmosphere I like to throw out there, whether it's Kenny Wallace live on the midway and uh some wrestling.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we've got a barbecue contest out in the campground this year.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: We've got a Cajun guy doing some cooking tonight for all the campers.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: And uh then, in addition to that, uh the new Belle Claire Speedway that we're involved with running a big show over there on Friday night.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: So it's we just want to create something where you can come in here and just take it all in and just be uh entertained from the time you get out of your car until the time you leave.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: I want to talk to you about Belle Claire in a second, but I want to ask more about where the fans come from.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: When you draw, as I mentioned, if anybody's been to your track, these the arch is right across the river, downtown St.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: Louis is right there.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: How many folks like from that area?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: And where else do people come to your racetrack from around the Midwest, Chris?
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, we were looking at some numbers.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: We've had uh attendees over the course of the four years that we've had so far, we've had attendees from all 50 states in over 30 countries, and we're closely tracking that right now.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: It looks like we're well over 40 states represented uh again this year.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: So uh big reach.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, for the most part, uh I would say uh the numbers that we're looking at, it's kind of 50-50.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's about 50% local, and then 50% people traveling here from you know more than 90 miles away.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: So uh the great thing about St.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Louis, it's so convenient, whether it's Indianapolis or Louisville, Kentucky, or Kansas City, you it all roads lead here, and uh so it's pretty easy to get to.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: So that works out very well for us.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: So it's been a few years now since the Cup Series came there.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: From when that first happened to where you are now.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, has it been sell out, sellout, sellout?
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the response has been tremendous, hasn't it?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: It it has been tremendous.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we've you know, we've had a sellout every year.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh this year, this for the first time ever, uh, yesterday, I was getting calls from uh folks that I know that I told them how to go online and get tickets.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: And their calling said, Hey, it's only showing that we have uh single tickets, we need pairs, and started looking, and we were fast approaching a sellout.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we did have some tickets that were held for a few sponsors and some of the industry folks that we we have to hold back.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: We started making phone calls to find out for sure did they need the tickets?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we moved up the the deadline for them so that we could put some more tickets out there.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: So we we put an additional 400 tickets uh into the market uh last night at seven o'clock, and we're seeing those go as well.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we're gonna be a sellout again, and uh a lot of it, it's uh there's a lot of things going on here in St.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: Louis this weekend.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and people are seeing that as an opportunity to come in and not only do stuff with us, but go see the Cardinals, go to the Zach Brown concert.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: There's you know, just a lot going on, and and it's really uh it's working out well for us.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's uh it's making it a destination race.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: To the point of you're so close to a to a city like St.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: Louis and you talk about other sports fans, right?
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: When you talk about now, it's not the playoffs anymore, obviously, it's the chase, but when you talk about the end of the season, the postseason, the championship run, does that resonate with the folks in the metro area that might follow other sports and maybe not so much NASCAR or motor sports?
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it it it gives another good talking point.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like it more than anything, that concept works with uh my communication with the the local media, the the stick and ball kind of guys, uh whether it's Frank Cusamano from NBC or Martin Kilcoin over at Fox, it gets them interested because it's kind of putting something you know uh on their radar that gives them something additional to talk about.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: For most of the fans, uh, they just want to know uh you know, is the race gonna be good?
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: Is there gonna be beating and banging?
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And which drivers are mad at each other this week.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: So that's that's what they really want to know.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you led me to my next question.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: We know which drivers on the cub side are mad at one another.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: Brad Kozlowski and Carson knows how much.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: I always heard a joke about that.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: We've been talking about it on Sirius X.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh a lot of folks don't like it to a degree, but we all know it's good for business, kind of how we say that.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Is that sort of move the needle a little bit more coming into your race weekend?
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: It has people that I didn't didn't know that they followed NASCAR are asking me about the the Brad and Carson controversy.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: So it's really it's got a lot of people excited about it, and then some of the other comments being made uh from others in the industry.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I have have one uh media person ask me, is like, does everybody in NASCAR hate one another?
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, I wish they all did because we'd sell more tickets.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: So uh it's it's getting some good uh good response, and we're playing up with it.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna be putting out a little uh little uh piece later today, thinking thinking about Don King and the Thrill of Manila.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna have some fun on the midway uh this year, uh down in the fan zone with uh some uh the hurricane versus bad Brad.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, gonna do some uh some have some fun stuff down there.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: I would have been disappointed if you didn't do something like that.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: So that's good to hear, Chris, this weekend.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I don't want to put the cart before the horse because it's a big race weekend, but next year the schedule came out, and you won't be in the chase, but you'll be in the summertime.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: What does that do, if anything, dynamic-wise to being on the NASCAR schedule next season, Chris?
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, you know, one of the things we're looking at is for our sponsor at Joey Illinois, uh, they they like the fact that it's not up against NFL just because of some of the ratings.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: And uh for us, another key factor is uh last year um we were up against the Kansas Mizzou football game that had a pretty big impact on uh some of the things that uh we were looking at.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we've had a great deal of success with that third weekend of August when you know we had the Bon Merito Automotive Group 500 on that date for many, many years.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's it's a date that works for us.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: I like it because it's before you know a lot of the kids haven't gone back to school yet.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: There's just there's some opportunities there that I'm perfectly fine with it, and I think it's gonna work out very well for us.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: So uh, you know, we're uh I think we're gonna be in good shape on that.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: All right, we'll look forward to that next summer.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: Last point I have to bring up another thing that's so unique about your racetrack is the fireworks and the explosions that go off on the back stretch.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And we've had drivers tell us the first year you did it, they didn't know it was coming.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: They were like, What's what's happening?
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it's really become sort of one of your calling cards there.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: How did that idea come about?
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: And for our listeners and fans who may not know about it, give a little more description of what they can expect.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I went to uh way too many concerts as a kid, and uh, I liked watching stuff blow up, the rock shows, you know.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and back going back a little bit with uh I worked for uh the company that's now Feld Motorsports.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: It was Pace Motorsports at the time, and I was producing monster truck shows and uh supercross events back in the 90s.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: And Charlie Mancuzo, who was my boss uh there at uh we were based out of Chicago from your neighborhood, um he was all about blowing things up and adding that spectacle to get things going.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: So when it when we started with our IndyCar race, we started doing it and it just took on a life of its own, and then it just kept getting bigger and bigger.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: And well, naturally we get NASCAR, so we might as well do it there, also.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh it's kind of become our calling card.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: And when you turn on a Super Bowl, uh the Super Bowl last year, and IndyCar does a segment and there's our fireball, and then less than an hour later, there's a NASCAR ad and there's my my fireball.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, in during the Super Bowl, I was like, okay, we're we're getting somewhere.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: This is you know resonating.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: And and people will call the sanctioning bodies and ask them, where's that place that things blow up?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: And they know that it's us.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: So the funny part about this is that while the fans love it and the NASCAR marketing department loves it, uh, the race, the drivers and the competition department absolutely hates it.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: So there's always this give and take.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: So uh I'm gonna go on record now thanking Elton Sawyer because Elton let me do it again this year, but we had to do some compromise.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be a little bit different this year, uh, but it's a lot of fun.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it it's just one of those things for me.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: I just want to add some thrill to the show, and uh, it's what a way to get people pumped up than blowing stuff up.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we'll look forward to that.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: Well, another thing that uh you know, connecting in here with our website, Midwestracingcentral.com, uh short tracks and lots of short tracks.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I'll go back to the question about the fans, and you asked, I asked you where they come from.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: How many short track fans from out there Friday, Saturday, even Sunday nights come to your racetrack on a race weekend?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it continues to grow, and we're making those connections.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um and that's one of the reasons that yeah, we got involved with Belleville.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: I've I've been uh a loyal supporter of all the racetracks in this area, as well as the the Wisconsin tracks.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: I've always been a sponsor since I've been here.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: I've been sponsoring the Oktoberfest at La Crosse.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: I've been a sponsor with uh Greg McCarnes's place there at Madison just because I'm a short track guy, that's what I came from.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I, you know, I love the the tradition of you work your way up through the short tracks.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: I was an Alan Kawicki fan as a kid, and I you know, I watched him come from the ASA up into NASCAR.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, we're short track people and we just want to keep that going.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we're trying to develop those relationships and uh because I I feel like for the longest time the short track community kind of moved away from the big show, and we're trying to get that that brought back and you know, go kind of going back a little bit.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: One of the the great things too about our date change next year is I won't be up against the world 100 at Eldora.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I have hundreds of people that I know that are here in the St.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: Louis area that are at the World 100, and some of them are gonna try to drive all night to get back here for our race.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but for a lot of those folks, I know that next year they'll be out here in our campground, and uh we'll we'll kind of be the tune-up for the world 100.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, by us being involved with the short track, um, it's kind of helped us in our community uh so that the short the short track fans, the dirt track fans primarily, they don't see us as this big corporate entity that nameless, faceless racetrack because we're not.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's Curtis in the next room and me, and we're racing guys.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: And by having that racetrack, we've been able to develop that connection where they feel comfortable coming up and talking to us and telling us what they like and they don't like, and it's really opened up a lot of doors for us.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh it's a little bit extra work, but it's something I really enjoy doing, and uh, I think it's gonna be pay dividends for us in just trying trying to pull the whole St.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: Louis and Midwest regional short track scene back into the fold with what we're doing on the big track as well.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: How long did it sit idle?
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then how much of a heavy lift was it to bring it back to life?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Over at Bel Claire.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it uh it closed shortly before COVID.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: I think they they ran their last race in October of 2019.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then during the the whole pro uh COVID situation, uh the the ownership group moved away, and then the county stepped up and bought the the facility.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we went over there to look at it to try to save the thing.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that was the original call.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Mark Kern, the county chairman, asked us to come over just to see if it could be rescued and what could run there.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we started walking around looking at it.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it was a you know beautiful old wooden grandstands and covered grandstands, and it had just such a special feel.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I started walking through and looking at everything, and uh, I'm on the phone with my insurance guy telling him about the situation of what the track is like, and we had to deliver the bad news that really, other than some uh events that you wouldn't be able to get insurance on, uh, you're not gonna be able to race at this track.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it being now being a county-owned property, they had to do it the right way.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we uh we worked with the county uh and they they said, Why don't you help us?
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: If you could just take a clean slate of paper and build a racetrack, what would you build?
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, I got one better than that.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: Let's drive over to Hobstud, Indiana to try uh try city speedway, or excuse me, try state speedway, see Tom Helfrich, and I want you to see his racetrack.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, I think that's something you could build here.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so we went over there and looked at that.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: They loved it.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it was a great USAC uh non-wing show that night.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: And uh on the drive back, Mark Kern, the county chairman, said, Why don't you just pull some images and you know get some ideas of if you were building your dream racetrack, what it would look like, how what the shape would be.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: So we started working on some designs, and then the county started buying additional property next to the uh the fairgrounds.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the footprint went from being a small little fifth-mile oval to us expanding out, and now it's a large quarter, and depending on where you measure it, it's almost a almost a three-eighths.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we were able to come up with this uh design and build this racetrack out, and uh it's it's absolutely fantastic.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's it's gonna be uh a great venue.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: We still have we're still working on figuring the dirt out.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: We've only had two races, but we had a fantastic uh event a couple weeks ago with the Mars Late Model series.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: I have the World of Outlaws coming in on October the 17th, so that's gonna be the the big one for us.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh uh we never would have imagined the World of Outlaws would be in at Belle Claire Fairgrounds, uh, but that's gonna be a fantastic show.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we've got a lot of plans.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: The county is fully supportive, all the county chairmen, uh the committees, the city.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's so unusual to see a small town that wants to have a racetrack in the middle of the town.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: So we not only did we were we able to do the impossible in bringing a racetrack back better than before, but we're doing it in the middle of uh a town, and the town is embracing it because they know what it means that there's going to be some life uh downtown Belleville.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it's uh we're working on a fantastic schedule for 2027.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: Well, congratulations on that.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: I saw the Mars race on flow.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: It looks great.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: I I can't wait to see it in person maybe next summer.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: Last point before you go, another short track connectivity to your area, the Gateway Nationals in the dome there that happens in December.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: I went to one indoor race in my life.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: My dad took me as a kid to the Silver Dome to see the ASA cars there way back when.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: My ears are still ringing from that, by the way, Chris, for all the races I've been to in my life.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: But what about that event and how how that has become really so popular down there in December?
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and that was one when they told me that they were gonna do it.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I I remember back to those old uh the old Silver Dome shows.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember at one time a dirt, they tried doing a dirt race in uh uh in Tampa, uh the dome there years and years ago.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: And uh uh I've I've always said the Chili Bowl figured out how to do it right.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it's possible somewhere else.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: So when you the first couple of years, man, they were struggling.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and Cody Somer, the promoter, he was he was calling me up and uh asking me questions about the bills that he was seeing for the cleaning after it was over with.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and honestly, I told him, I said, Cody, I said if you, you know, you I know you're gonna lose a couple hundred thousand the first year.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: I said, if you can make it to year three and get on the positive side, I think you're gonna be in good shape.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: And that's that happened.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: And they've done such an amazing job with that event.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: It it exceeded what I uh ever thought it would would do.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: And it's and that's another one of those where uh it kind of shows just how great of a town St.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Louis is in that appeal, because all the folks that are coming in from all over that are coming here uh to this area, and that's kind of helping put a spotlight on what we do.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: I know we pick up, we get a lot of folks that come through the Christmas lights on their way over to the dome when we're doing our Christmas light show.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but it it's really uh it just kind of shows the strength of St.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: Louis as a racing town that it supports that one as well.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: And those guys are lucky because uh I've yet to hear an advertisement for that event because they don't have to.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's selling out and uh uh it's becoming taking on a life of its own.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's really a crown jewel event.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And what we're hoping we can do over at Belle Claire is that we can build some uh outdoor crown jewel events for the St.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Louis area and let them have their uh indoor crown jewel event in the winter, and we'll just keep building this town up into being the center of racing in America.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's our goal.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I appreciate your time, appreciate all you do, not just at Worldwide Technology, but before the short track community as well.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Best of luck this weekend and uh look forward to seeing you out there uh at a short track somewhere soon, Chris.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: All right, Pete.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's Chris Blair from Worldwide Technology Raceway.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: Keep it right here at uh Midwest RacingCentral.com.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of stuff going on this weekend.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: We've got the Wisconsin State Championships at Jefferson Speedway up in Wisconsin, the Harvest Hustle on the dirt at Sycamore Speedway, and of course we'll keep you on top on top of all that stuff right here at Midwest RacingCentral.com.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Pete Pistoni, thanks for watching Midwest Racing Central today.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see you next week.