After months of uncertainty, the city's drag racing facility has been sold to a non-profit organization which intends to keep the quarter-mile track in the hands of the community.
The Northern Interior Timed Racing Organization (NITRO) began operating the track last year and has finalized a deal with owner Brent Marshall to buy the 138-acre site, which includes a mudbog pit, motocross track, stocked fish pond and sandy beach.
Backed by a group of local investors, NITRO intends to use money raised from International Hot Rod Association (IHRA) sanctioned events and its weekly Friday Night Street Legal race events to pay off a $600,000 loan used to purchase the facility, now called NITRO Motorsports Park. The drag strip retains its name, Rolling Mix Concrete Raceway. Marshall has owned the track since 2012.
"The facility will never come out of club hands now," said NITRO vice-president Foji Dhanshaw. "There was always a risk, in private hands, that it could turn into a subdivision or just disappear. What it allows us now as a club is to secure the future of drag racing in Prince George. Brent has been a big supporter of all this and he really worked with us just so it could stay in the club's hands."
Marshall says in the four years he owned it he's invested $1.3 million in the facility, including the original purchase price and improvements to make the track more accommodating to racers and spectators. He built new washroom/shower/laundry facilities, stocked a man-made pond with trout to encourage kids to learn how to fish, created a beach area and playground, and with help from Rolling Mix Concrete and IDL Projects, repaved a 720-foot concrete section of the strip to improve the staging area and first section -- a $300,000 project.
This year the club has invested in new staging light and a timing system, which should be operational within the next month.
Marshall put the track on the market last fall and had several offers from developers. He is a drag racer and would not agree to sell unless there was a commitment to keep the facility open for racing.
"They obviously wanted to develop it and do something else and B.C. and the north wouldn't have this facility, so we worked out a deal to assist NITRO to buy it," said Marshall. "So it will stay in Prince George, and that was my vision. I sold it for less than half of what I had into it to make it work so it stays in the community."
Dhanshaw said there would be no place to race had the track been sold to a developer. Airstrips are becoming increasingly difficult to secure and the cost of buying land and building a strip elsewhere would be millions of dollars. NITRO is counting on local businesses to get behind racing and help the 60-member club pay off its 15-year mortgage.
"This does put a lot of pressure on the society and the biggest key is sponsorship to help us pay the facility off," said Dhanshaw. "The idea is to get it paid off as fast as possible."
The cost of operating the track on a weekend, including insurance, is between $5,000 and $6,000, Dhanshaw said. Street legal racing has been the track's primary revenue-generator the past few years, but with NITRO's intention to join IHRA, Prince George will host three sanctioned bracket racing points meets this season. Those meets will draw out-of-town entries from Fort St. John and Edmonton, whose drag strips are affiliated with IHRA.
"This will be our first full season to promote weekend events and we have four major races planned," said Dhanshaw, a longtime racer who has presided over drag racing clubs in Terrace and Fort St. John.
"On a Friday night we average 80 or 100 cars and on a weekend we would average about 125 cars. The goal is to get that to 160 or 170."
The street legal series begins on Friday, May 6 and continues every Friday except long weekends through Sept. 16. IHRA points meets are set for May 12-13, June 4-5 and July 9-10. NITRO will also host a Big Rig race night on June 25 and a nostalgia drag meet for cars made in 1986 or before, July 16-17. The Big Bucks Shootout, with guaranteed purse and limited entries, is scheduled for Aug. 6-7.
The track also hosts snowmobile drags racing in the winter.
Marshall sold his rear-engine dragster to Dhanshaw and is looking to purchase a funny car capable of six-second passes at 200 miles per hour. Marshall maintains residences in Prince George and Kelowna and plans to race regularly at Rolling Mix Concrete Raceway.
"After we ground the concrete last year, we now have the best starting lane in the country, so we'll start to bring some impressive names out here," said Marshall. "Everyone who has come out to see it from other places says it's the most beautiful facility in Canada. and everyone can rest easy knowing it's going to stay in the community.
"We're really fortunate Foji and NITRO came up with this idea."
NITRO Motorsport Park timeline
1978 -- Original owners Gordon Schade and Ernie Schultz open North Central Motorsport Park.
1994 - Ron Cowie of Tsawwassen buys facility after Schade dies. Cowie makes improvements to bring the track up to National Hot Rod Association standards.
1995 -- NCMP becomes the northernmost NHRA track and hosts its first Division 6 points meets.
2010 -- Shane Lodjn buys track from Cowie.
2011 -- Track changes its name to Prince George Motorsports Park and switches to International Hot Rod Association as the sanctioning body.
2012 -- Brent Marshall takes over ownership of the track, which is renamed Northland Dodge Motorsports Park.
2013 -- Rolling Mix Concrete and IDL Projects make $300,000 investment to repave staging area and first section of drag strip. New washroom/shower/laundry facilities installed
2015 -- NITRO (Northern Interior Timed Racing Organization) takes over operation of the facility. Salem Contracting donates $20,000 to grind concrete track to improve traction for high-horsepower vehicles.
2016 -- Marshall agrees to sell the track to NITRO.
