September 7, 2004 Hurricane Frances Plays Havoc With Florida Racing By Jack Smith Evacuations, nailing plywood, waiting in line for gas, looking for ice and watching the Weather Channel have replaced what is normally a month for some super racing at local Florida speedways. Division championships and getting the right setup for your racecar has taken a back seat to warming up the chainsaws, repairing roofs and trying to find dry, high ground. New Smyrna Speedway, still reeling from the wrath of Hurricane Charley, again suffered considerable damage over the Labor Day weekend. "New Smyrna had the same damage that it had, times two", said Don Nerone on Tuesday. "Tore some more lights down, the ones we didn't get back up yet, tore some more buildings down, we got tore up some more and we will fix it again. I guess that's what we do", the FASCAR general manager explained. New Smyrna suffered major damage from Hurricane Charley three weeks ago, and sitting only 16 miles from the coast took a pounding hour after hour as the slow moving Frances pushed across the state, sparing few from it's winds and rain. Orlando Speedworld fared well again with only very minor damage to signs, while FASCAR's newest race track, Columbia Motorsports Park, located in Lake City, sustained some wind to older structures and signs damage and also water damage. "The infield was under 3 to 4 feet of water, building under water, but that is easily repairable", explained Nerone. On the other coast East Bay Raceway Park was under water on Monday, and the racing surface itself is still under water today. Co-owner Todd Hutto put it rather bluntly, "We made out fair, we didn't make out great, but fair, we could be raceable if we didn't have 4 foot seas running through the track." Even after crossing the state Frances packed some intense power in her winds, with East Bay also suffering significant wind damage to the breezeways and concession areas and roofs peeled off several of the office buildings. "The big signs and all that stuff got blown down again, and of course the water, that's the big thing", Hutto explained. East Bay Raceway Park is located in Gibsonton Florida, a mile form the Alafia River, and la half-mile from Hillsborough Bay. Being nearly surrounded by water has produced the oft debated question of whether the tides affect the clay racing surface; many locals swear it does. The area is certain to be at the mercy of the elements for some time as the Alafia River is not expected to crest until Wednesday at 23.7 feet, 10.7 feet above flood stage. Combined with winds blowing in off the Gulf and more rain expected over the next few days are probably not going to help the situation. Bronson Motor Speedway had only very minor effects from the storm and expects to race on Friday with a $1000 to win Mini Stock 50 lap feature, with Modifieds, Sportsmans, Pure Stocks and V-8 Bombers. DeSoto Speedway reported some damage to the lighting at the track in East Manatee County, while Auburndale had it's main sign knocked down, and promoter J.T. Beard is still unsure about this weekend's schedule. Sunshine Speedway in Largo was affected by minor wind damage and again water, according to reports from local residents. Attempts to reach Putnam County Speedway, Volusia County Speedway and Citrus County Speedway were unsuccessful and we lost our phone connection with Don Nerone before getting the FASCAR plans for the coming weekend but we will update you as soon as we do make contact with their officials. Hialeah Speedway had one light pole snap in half but promoter Dru Ogden said "luckily it didn't pull down any other lights or cause any outages for the rest of the lights, we are looking good." He added "we lost one snack bar awning and our scoreboard got bent a little but we will bend it back with the tow truck, so we are good to go". Hialeah, in it's last year of operation features a full racing slate this weekend, including Late Model Sportsman, Mini Stocks, a full field of Street Stocks and Cyclones. The promoter's cell phone is 305-992-2717 for those racers interested in visiting Florida's most southern race track. Charlotte County Speedway and the surrounding areas are still digging their way out of the mess Hurricane Charley left behind, with some residents just recently getting their power back on. All in all we are probably very lucky that Frances spent much of her energy in the Bahamas, and lost some of her wind power before reaching the Florida coastline. It could have been much worse. Thus far 2004 the weather is proving to be a disastrous one for race tracks and it may get worse before it gets better. Computer models are showing Hurricane Ivan may be edging close to the Florida peninsula on Saturday, which could potentially bring more unwanted rain, wind and chaos to the Sunshine State, already reeling with power outages and worse. Hopefully a right turn into the Atlantic Ocean will spare Floridians and others from a third major storm this year. RELATED NEWS: HURRICANE FRANCES SPARES SPEEDWORLD Have an opinion on this story? Post a message on our Message Board! <news@karnac.org>or send a letter to the editor!