Near the end of Monday's notebook I mentioned that a post had been made about the rebirth of the Mineral City Speedway in Fort Dodge and now there is confirmation in the form of a press release from The Messenger regarding the new Frontier Sports Park and the newly named Frontier Speedway.
A firm known as TJK Entertainment LLC that was founded by Fort Dodge residents Tim and Kellie Guderian after they won a $220.8 million Powerball jackpot about eight years ago has purchased the property and has some exciting plans for it even above and beyond the racing. I know, I know, the old saying of "you know how to make a small fortune promoting auto racing? Start with a big one" might be going through your head right now, but I have already purchased my Powerball ticket for tonight's drawing worth $208 million and one of the things on my to-do list with the winnings is also to purchase a race track. So hopefully I will have an announcement to make soon as well.
One thing that did jump out at me in that press release was where "Jerome Moulds, the newly hired director of operations and promoter of Frontier Sports Park, said racing there will begin in mid-February and continue throughout the year." Perhaps they plan some snowmobile racing to get things started?
Mineral City Speedway ran just a couple of events before shutting down last year so this is yet another track coming back to weekly life out in that part of the state. Recall that they already gained one with Spencer now running weekly on Fridays, Britt moving to Saturday and Algona shifting to Thursdays.
The news on this side of the state is not so good in regard to weekly racing, at least when it comes to the number of tracks that will be running weekly shows as it will remain to be seen if that quarter of the state can support that many tracks.
Late this afternoon former track promoter Kathy Dlouhy posted the following on the iowastockcars.com forum:
"I am posting this on behalf of The Cedar County Fair Board:
Unfortunately there will not be any weekly racing at Cedar County Raceway in 2015.
We are very sorry for the delay and the late notice but it was unavoidable. We are still working hard to get these issues resolved so we can move forward and possibly have some specials.
We will still have the Sprint Invaders at the fair on July 10th as planned. I will keep everyone informed of any news on specials.
This was one of the hardest posts I’ve ever made; it is truly a sad day for racing…"
Yes, it is a sad day for those drivers and fans who have been supporting the track in Tipton, but the problem is that there just has not been enough of either over the past few years to keep the track up and running weekly. There are still opportunities (see final paragraphs of this link) to have racing at the track that I have enjoyed several great nights of action at over the years, but for now weekly racing is just not feasible.
Things can change though, you just never know. Somebody in town might win $208 million tonight......
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