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Ellisville Speedway is located in Ellisville, Fl. about 10 miles south of Lake City. It's a half mile asphalt race track that had laid dormant until it was leased by Robert Ford Sr. from the owner of New Smyrna Speedway, Robert Heart. It had been closed for most of last season and opened back up in September 2012. This Saturday will be the tenth race since it's reopening. Robert Sr. has a history with the track being a driver at the track in the 90's. He drove a street stock with the number 66. Following in his footsteps, Robert Ford Jr. raced there also until it closed down.
Robert Ford Jr. drove the sportsman number 1 car and was the one responsible for talking his dad into leasing the track to open it back up. There were drivers who had raced there that wanted to have somewhere to run again and Robert Sr. listened. They were friends with Robert Heart, the owner of New Smyrna Speedway and talked to him about leasing the track and the rest is history. It's always a good thing when someone takes the initiative to take on a big task like opening up a race track that has been closed. It was a slow start at first but it has built each week and turned around the fan and car count.
This Saturday night Ellisville Speedway will be running late models, street stock, thunder stock, hornets (4 cylinder cars) that will be running 25 laps for $300 to win, EMods that will run a 25 lap feature for $325 to win, they will probably also be running strictly stock which is a regular car with a roll cage and seat belts. Gates will be opening 3pm and grandstands at 5pm with racing starting at 7pm. Robert Sr. wants to make his track a family-oriented track by helping families out with tickets prices making them $10 to get into the grandstands and kids 11 and under free. For a man with 10 grandkids this is very important.
The future looks bright for the track with a truck race (not Nascar) coming to the track hopefully in June and a schedule being made for the rest of the year. What's important to him is getting the drivers' opinions and he will be having a driver's meeting to do just that. If it's possible he wants to run 3 weeks out of the month with a weekend off to let the drivers regroup. Asphalt tracks are a breed of their own and the drivers that drive them are the same. It's not the same as dirt but just as fun and just as much blood, sweat and tears are poured into it. If you've never been to one you need to come Saturday night to Ellisville and see what you've been missing. I highly doubt you'll leave disappointed.
