SAS site of Electrathon Competition

[Pacecar]

San Antonio Speedway was the site for the Alamo City Electrathon competition.

See video:

https://www.ksat.com/education/students-compete-at-second-annual-alamo-city-electrathon

 

[debwill]

Interesting!   It looks like they had to clean up the track to hold the competition.  But the grandstands still look overgrown.

[rocket55]

That's pretty cool...glad to see someone is using the track for something.

 

[top_shelf_12]

Interesting indeed. Still hard to see that place though. So many voices and sounds from years past. Track looked good though. Man I miss that place and the state of asphalt racing from the 80s to early 2000s.

[JamesHigdon]

Looks like it could be used for racing anytime!

[Definitive]

Crap....I thought I was over that place.

[NickHolt]

I'll still looking for a MAJOR investor.  This place could be a showplace and the hub of asphalt racing West of the Mississippi.  And I have a management team already in mind.. Just saying.

Nick

[Radical]

4 hours ago, NickHolt said:

I'll still looking for a MAJOR investor.  This place could be a showplace and the hub of asphalt racing West of the Mississippi.  And I have a management team already in mind.. Just saying.

Nick

Nick, once I win the lottery. Winning the lottery will be the easy, convincing the wife will be the hard part.

[RodneyRodriguez]

MAJOR is the key word there.

[576]

How much Nick?

[rocket55]

On 5/28/2018 at 12:59 PM, NickHolt said:

I'll still looking for a MAJOR investor.  This place could be a showplace and the hub of asphalt racing West of the Mississippi.  And I have a management team already in mind.. Just saying.

Nick

I was wondering what was going on with this track. Seems like it needs some TLC and quality management. A 1/2 mile asphalt track with all the modern updates....I'd could easily agree it would be quite the showplace. I'm curious what the details of the property are...price and acreage. 

[NickHolt]

 

6 hours ago, 576 said:

How much Nick?

The numbers I have heard from various sources are all over the place.  Some say it can be patched up and operational for as little as $750K. But that's just patching up and making do with much of what's left of the place. To me, that number, if even realistic, would just be putting off the infrastructure improvements that are sorely needed.  Oh, and that doesn't include the purchase price for the property which is also very much speculated about, but seems to be about $1 million depending on how many acres are actually purchased. Keep in mind that Terry Dickerson attempted to by the land and facility way back in the day and offered over $1 million and was turned down several times. I know that for a fact because i was the guy who wrote the proposals for him.

Several years ago, one of the estimators working for a local (large, well-known) contractor, gave me a couple of book-end estimates. One or two of the staff at that company had connections to the track at the time and were hoping that their company would jump in and take over the track. 

The low end estimate was simply repairing the sub-surface and walls of the track without repaving the track, building simple replacement buildings for the ones that were unusable (even a that point in time), restoring electrical service and septic system and installing new water supply up to SA code, replacing whatever grandstand wood needed replacing and restoring the scoring tower and VIP room. No grade work other than the track substrata. No parking lot work. No new buildings, no pit work, not score board work. No soil remediation. No state of the art track lighting, No amenities other than a simple office space under the grandstands, No concession facilities. In other words, just what it bare-bones take to pull off a series of events for several years without violating city codes. 

That estimate was $2.6 million.  Remember, that was several years ago and several other buildings have been removed/demolished since then. 

The high end was open ended, but he felt a 1st class entertainment venue / race track would require everything to be engineered and built from scratch except the grandstand support structure, the racing surface and some of the concrete barriers. He estimated that would run between 6 and 8 million. 

His company big-wigs took a look at the numbers and that ended the discussion right quick. 

I have also worked with several potential purchasers over the years - some were sincere, some were simply tire kickers. None of them felt it was a good investment. 

That being said, there may well be someone somewhere with lots of money and a huge love of the sport and no desire to ever see a return on his/her investment. if that person is around, have them give me a call.

Nick

 

 

[JamesHigdon]

I'd like to add that having worked with an investor and a different buyer Mr Holt's numbers are much the same as what we found. The property is currently listed at roughly $1 million but I had been quoted significantly lower than that in negotiations with the Reeh family that owns the property. The track COULD BE and HAS BEEN operated pretty much as it sits with portable lights and restroom facilities but that makes break-even a difficult proposition. The basic improvements to the track for long-term use would run at roughly the cost of the facility depending upon how they where done.

I worked with a buyer that is a successful race promoter in a different area who wanted his own track to promote and felt SAS would be "The Place" as its reputation as being one of the faster tracks in the country would make it easy to promote bigger races at. The buyer fell away as his home and business where destroyed by Harvey but he had a pen to paper plan that showed blue-sky. San Antonio is currently (depending upon whose metrics you use) the fastest growing city in the country in a state that if it where a country would be the world's 10th largest. The money and people are here, the track just needs the right promoter. On a side note the former IHRA drag-strip that was San Antonio Raceway is now Alamo City Motorplex and there have been inklings that they are working towards an oval track so who knows...

[RodneyRodriguez]

glad to hear that I told some folks that thought when CTS closed seems like an ideal spot. Austin, SA, Houston all right in line.

[JamesHigdon]

5 hours ago, RodneyRodriguez said:

glad to hear that I told some folks that thought when CTS closed seems like an ideal spot. Austin, SA, Houston all right in line.

Look at tracks like CNB Raceway Park that UMI Suspension bought and turned into UMI Motorsports Park or Jukasa Speedway (formerly Cayuga) that was bought and had millions spent on it or Langley that was closed for a year then reopened and has been repaved and had money spent on it or even I37 that closed for 5 years then came back stronger then it ever had been in the first place. Tracks are coming back and being rebuilt as the economy improves and people are coming around. A positive attitude and the willingness to keep an open mind will go a long way towards the revival of local racing in the area.

[ffmedic42]

Correct me if I'm wrong, Wasn't it Toyota that forced the city to annex SAS?

[JamesHigdon]

11 hours ago, ffmedic42 said:

Correct me if I'm wrong, Wasn't it Toyota that forced the city to annex SAS?

To the best of my knowledge no; as far as I understand it Toyota would have preferred the land around the plant to stay rural while the city wanted it to be developed and have homes built. When the city annexed all the land around the plant (placed it in their ETJ) with intentions of it being built in Toyota went as far as threatening to leave.

[TexasTornado]

Local racing has obviously been on a continuous nose dive for years.  Same problem exists throughout most parts of the country.  Even in "racing country", tracks are struggling badly.  Pensacola struggles to have cars (5 trucks started a feature a month or so ago), Nashville struggles, Caraway in North Carolina recently put an end to its weekly program, the Modifieds of Mayhem series has only had 7 or 8 cars at most events, Mobile had 3 or 4 outlaw stocks run a feature a few weeks ago.  Most of these tracks were once "hubs" for a successful racing program.  If its not working there, why would it work here?  SAS was reopened once, the first October race was extremely successful (from the fans standpoint, not sure about the $$$ side for the promoters), the second race was decent, after that car counts dwindled and so did interest.  HMP's July race last year paid a better purse than the modified race pays at the Snowball, no out of town cars came.  Outside of Minnesota/Wisconsin, the extreme northeast and once a year in Pensacola, racing is continuing to die.  It's not what everybody wants to see, but it's reality. 

[arob]

Racing is not dying but asphalt racing is. The decline of NASCAR , cost of racing asphalt and the lack of big money races didn't help. As asphalt tracks closed a lot of asphalt racers went dirt or quit and I doubt you could get many of the now dirt racers to return to asphalt. HMP , God bless them , is doing what they can. They had that what $5000 to win $500 to start Late Model race and only 12 or so cars showed. But like Mr. Nick says with the right facility with the right promoter it could work again. It would take patience as you will have to build the racer pool back up. I grew up watching asphalt racing at C.C. Speedway , Longhorn , SAS and a little THR/CTS and loved every minute of it. 

 

[Bobby]

2 hours ago, arob said:

Racing is not dying but asphalt racing is. ....... As asphalt tracks closed a lot of asphalt racers went dirt or quit and I doubt you could get many of the now dirt racers to return to asphalt. ...

 

We can't even get them to return to dirt. 

Houston used to have four dirt tracks fighting each other for decent fields every weekend.  Now we have two dirt tracks fighting each other for decent fields every weekend.

[arob]

That is strange in a city of that size. 

 

[JamesHigdon]

On 5/31/2018 at 10:18 AM, TexasTornado said:

Local racing has obviously been on a continuous nose dive for years.  Same problem exists throughout most parts of the country.  Even in "racing country", tracks are struggling badly.  Pensacola struggles to have cars (5 trucks started a feature a month or so ago), Nashville struggles, Caraway in North Carolina recently put an end to its weekly program, the Modifieds of Mayhem series has only had 7 or 8 cars at most events, Mobile had 3 or 4 outlaw stocks run a feature a few weeks ago.  Most of these tracks were once "hubs" for a successful racing program.  If its not working there, why would it work here?  SAS was reopened once, the first October race was extremely successful (from the fans standpoint, not sure about the $$$ side for the promoters), the second race was decent, after that car counts dwindled and so did interest.  HMP's July race last year paid a better purse than the modified race pays at the Snowball, no out of town cars came.  Outside of Minnesota/Wisconsin, the extreme northeast and once a year in Pensacola, racing is continuing to die.  It's not what everybody wants to see, but it's reality. 

Alamo Dragway NEVER drew the crowds SAR does and I37 before it closed and Texas Dirt Speedway never drew crowds like I37 does now. The biggest races ever put on for Asphalt racing have been run at Bristol the last two years. NFL, NBA, NHL and others are all struggling to draw fans and local racing isn’t immune to that but there is a lot of bright area in with the problems. 

[HiTech]

I 37 has picked a good time to reopen with all the other tracks closed in that area .goliad .sas .cts cc speedway  and others I cant thank of .some of the racers I see racing dirt now  just as were are moved to dirt and it would be hard to get us back . money and changes to equipment cost could make it hard ..but anyone who would spend the money to fix sas  and go for broke long term we would find a way to race there ........... cost of a car now dirt or other wise is a killer .

[Alloutpc17]

On 6/4/2018 at 5:16 AM, HiTech said:

I 37 has picked a good time to reopen with all the other tracks closed in that area .goliad .sas .cts cc speedway  and others I cant thank of .some of the racers I see racing dirt now  just as were are moved to dirt and it would be hard to get us back . money and changes to equipment cost could make it hard ..but anyone who would spend the money to fix sas  and go for broke long term we would find a way to race there ........... cost of a car now dirt or other wise is a killer  

I agree. I gurantee you i have spent enough on my dirt street stock to buy a nice pro late model. People say big mods are expensive to race. Umm no, it's just as much as a street stock these days with the rules and the cars are not far off from lap times either. Sport mods are the fastest cars now and they are not supposed to be lol. 

[Josh42]

I have to disagree with Alamo Dragway never drawing a crowd.  In its hey days Alamo Dragway would pull the crowds as,  toward the end of its run it was having to compete against SAR, SAS and every other new age attraction there was.  SAR doesn't pull crowds for weekly shows no drag strip pulls a crowd for a bracket race, unless they have some kind of side show that the bracket cars run with.  SAR pulls crowds but only for National Event, Street Outlaws No Prep Kings, Dirty South No Prep, other than that they really don't pull much of a crowd in drag racing terms.   What SAR does to make the place looked packed is they have a morning event and an evening event to keep the place jazzed up all day instead of spreading it over multiple days.