Mark has been working all summer on the construction of a
new quarter-midget track located in the infield of New Smyrna
Speedway." I am excited for racing to get started at the track, but I've learned there is a whole lot more to building a track than I expected," Mark said. "The NASCAR track owners certainly don't have to worry about me competing with them."
The inspiration for Mark's project at New Smyrna Speedway was his 8-year-old son, Matt, who began racing a quarter-midget last year near Orlando, Fla. Mark wanted to have a track closer to home for many of the local kids.
"I started the project along with Robert Hart, who owns the New Smyrna track, and several of our friends in the community to help kids in the area be able to have a place to race," Mark said. "We wanted to provide an opportunity for local kids to get started in racing. We have received a lot of help from people in the community and local businesses that are also really excited to do something for the kids. We welcome any corporate sponsorship to help support this worthwhile investment."
The track will be a standard 1/20th-mile oval and will operate on Wednesday evenings. It will have Quarter Midget Association sanctioning and a local club. The track will host six divisions each week, and each car will be equipped with a transponder for electronic scoring to minimize the delays between races. Since part of the season will be run during the school year, Mark and the board of directors are doing everything possible to make it an early evening for kids and parents.
Paving of the track begins next week, and Mark plans on having the first race within 4-6 weeks.
"We hope to get going before the season ends in November," he said. "This year we will run a few races for fun, and next year we will run all season for points."
