The Return of North Wilkesboro Speedway, NASCAR's Most Famous Ghost Track
Back in February 2020, officials from Wilkes County in North Carolina announced that they were trying to reach Speedway Motorsports ownership in order to discuss reviving North Wilkesboro Speedway. It looked like there was very little chance of it happening. I recall tweeting as much at the time. This was NASCAR's most famous ghost track, after all, deteriorating since the big show left in the late 1990s. How glad I was to be wrong, as I watched the start of a CARS Tour race kick off from the top of the stands in turn one on a warm August evening in 2022.
Working in racing has left me a bit jaded to some track experiences; few races stand out as specifically memorable. Walking into North Wilkesboro Speedway just as the sun was setting, though, seeing tens of thousands of people filling the long-empty stands is a moment that's going to rank high on my list, all the way up there with pitting my first race at Daytona and walking into Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the first time.
Living roughly 50 miles east of North Wilkesboro Speedway made the decision to attend the races scheduled during this Racetrack Revival Wednesday an easy one. Since the green flag was scheduled for 7:30pm, I figured that leaving at 5:45 for my 50-minute drive would be plenty of time. I realized that I didn’t account for the Dale Jr. factor as I stood in traffic two miles south of the track more than an hour later. It’s fitting that the participation of Dale Earnhardt Jr. in this CARS Tour race brought out such a large crowd, as one of his tweets was a large catalyst for the speedway coming back into existence.
The effort to revitalize North Wilkesboro Speedway all started on an airplane that Earnhardt Jr. was sharing with CEO Marcus Smith of Speedway Motorsports, Inc. (SMI) back in the fall of 2019. Dale Jr. ended up on Smith’s plane because his own plane was damaged in a crash a month earlier so they got to chatting and Dale Jr. suggested that North Wilkesboro should be scanned so that it could be added to iRacing and at least preserved virtually before it fully decayed. Smith agreed so Dale Jr. reached out to Steve Myers at iRacing to see if they could happen and since Myers was hesitant at first, Dale Jr. decided to send out a tweet to persuade him.
Hundreds of responses rolled in which eventually culminated in the cleanup of the track in December of 2019. Volunteers and workers from Bristol Motor Speedway joined Dale Jr. and his team, bringing out landscaping and track-sweeping equipment so they could get it clean enough to be scanned. The scan was successfully completed just as virtual racing was ramping up due to the cancellation of in-person sporting events amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The virtual North Wilkesboro track ended up being used as the finale of the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series, broadcast live on Fox and FS1 in May of 2020.
Virtual racing brought North Wilkesboro Speedway to a larger audience and it gave fuel to the locals in Wilkes County who had been pushing for its return. But attention wasn’t enough on its own to push SMI to make a decision. The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 did help push things along. The $1.9 trillion economic stimulus bill was signed into law on March 11, 2021 by President Joe Biden with the goal of speeding up the country’s recovery from the effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Two months after the American Rescue Plan Act got its approval, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper announced that a portion of those funds would be allocated towards SMI tracks to include Charlotte Motor Speedway, Rockingham, and North Wilkesboro. The North Carolina state budget was signed in November 2021 and North Wilkesboro was allocated $18 million out of the $40 million that was allocated to those Speedway Motorsports tracks. This started new conversations, and soon the racing world welcomed the announcement during the Bristol Dirt weekend in April of 2022 that racing would return to North Wilkesboro.
Fast forward to August of 2022 when I decide to approach the track from the southern side of Highway 421. Friends already inside have warned me of delays getting in because of how many people decided to show up. I decide to exit from the highway a little earlier and drive up some of the fun curvy roads of Wilkes County and approach using Fishing Creek Road, only to find a few others with the same idea.
As I’m sitting in traffic I see people getting out of their cars to negotiate with the locals to park in their driveways. Others hunt for some space far enough from the road to park their cars and leave them there just so they can make the walk to the track. I decide to continue creeping up the road and after about thirty minutes of sitting in traffic I reach a farm field that has been converted into an impromptu parking lot. I pass hundreds of cars and freshly baled hay as I pull into the field and find a spot.
I’ve arrived just in time as I can hear some of the pre-race activities in the distance and see performers gliding down into the track with sponsor banners. I make my way out of the field and walk north across the bridge that goes over the highway to reach a crowd entering the track. The Racetrack Revival staff is out trying to help as many people as they can and is incredibly lenient as people try to pull up digital tickets on phones that barely have signal. I run into a staff member who has a stack of entry wristbands and trade $25 for one so I can go straight into the track.
I walk up the hill that’s behind turn two and reach an incredible crowd in line for local food trucks. Crowds are huge wherever you turn but once I cross under the stands I am impressed by the energy of what’s happening inside as people are taking their seats in preparation of the start of the CARS Tour race. I roam the grounds just taking everything in and enjoying the vibe. So much life has been brought back into this place. I understand why there were so many people working on bringing this track back for so long.
While roaming around I ran into many friends and colleagues from all walks of racing who made the trek to see this track back in action. Some had worked races here back in its heyday while others are like me and seeing their first racing on track here. The start of the CARS Tour race ends up getting delayed a few times because there are so many people still trying to enter the track. Eventually the sold-out crowd fills the stands and the green flag waves at 8:20pm under an orange sky behind the old suites.
The CARS Tour provides exciting racing during its whole season but this race is special as it’s the return of Dale Earnhardt Jr. to a late model stock car race for the first time since 1997. He is driving a bright green Sun Drop-liveried car that starts in the third row ahead of some of the CARS Tour regulars including Chad McCumbee who coincidentally played Dale Jr. in the 2004 ESPN movie “3: The Dale Earnhardt Story.”
The drivers settled into a rhythm as the race reaches the middle point so I decide to make my way back to those food trucks I saw upon entering and try to decide where I could find the shortest line. I eventually picked one that had typical burger and hot dog fare but as I reach the window to order, I see that almost half the menu has been covered because the items have sold out. Nevertheless, I'm able to come away with a Philly cheesesteak, a hot dog, and some chips along with a fresh-made lemonade.
I make it back up to the top of the turn one stands to watch the finish of the race and to see the crowd start to get wilder as Dale Jr. makes his way up to third. The race is eventually won by Carson Kvapil, who drives for Dale Jr.-owned JR Motorsports so Dale Jr. joins him in a celebratory salute to the fans after the races. The crowd goes wild. The stands are a sea of green Sun Drop shirts as the cars pull back into the pits.
A portion of the crowd leaves after the completion of the CARS Tour race, but I stay to catch the vintage race and the street stock races that follow before making the walk back to the farm to find my car. I pull out of my parking spot and get into a long line to head home. While I wait there I reflect on just how fun of an experience it was to see a race at North Wilkesboro.
All of the analysis I had done in the past with just how complex it would be to bring back racing at North Wilkesboro seems minimal after seeing the energy of a race there. Much of the investment piece has been solved by the fund from the American Rescue Plan Act and while traffic was definitely an issue because of the limited infrastructure, I can definitely see that there are possibilities to make it better so that events like this can be hosted in the future. Not only do I want to see more local short track racing, but I want to see a NASCAR national series run on this track once again. So does NASCAR; the response to the revival of North Wilkesboro was strong enough to alter the 2023 Cup Series schedule.
The big show is coming back to North Wilkesboro as the track will host the 2023 NASCAR All-Star race per an announcement that was appropriately made by Governor Cooper, Marcus Smith, and Dale Jr. along with NASCAR leadership in the North Carolina state capital. I can’t wait to catch more racing at this historic track. Seeing a race at North Wilkesboro made me a believer.
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