O'Reilly Raceway Park
In 1958, led by Tom Binford, Frank Dickie, Roger Ward and Howard Fieger, 15 Indianapolis area businessmen and racing professionals invested $5,000.00 each to fund the development of what would become O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis. The group purchased a 267-acre farm about seven miles from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and developed a multipurpose auto racing facility.
The original intention in creating O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis was to design a 15-turn, 2.5 mile road course. Nearly
as an afterthought, and as an insurance measure against economic
problems, the investment group decided to incorporate a quarter-mile
drag strip into the long straightaway of the 2.5-mile long road course
design.
Constructed with assistance from the
NHRA, the drag strip was the first of the three courses to be
completed, with the facility’s first event held on the strip in the
fall of 1960. During the 1960 U. S. Nationals in Detroit, a handshake agreement between Binford and NHRA founder Wally Parks promised that the event would move to ORP in 1961. The
historic three-year pact was signed and sealed under a tree in Detroit
Dragway’s pits and ORP eventually became the home of the NHRA’s biggest
annual event.
The NHRA purchased the entire facility in 1979. The first major improvement came in 1983 with the construction and dedication of Parks Tower, the four-story drag strip tower. In 1998, new grandstands, suites and a tower complex on the front straightway were completed at the oval track at a cost of nearly $2.5 million, which included the repaving of the entire oval surface as part of a three-phase facility improvement project. In 2001, NHRA and ORP constructed a new drag strip racing surface, replacing the strip with a 660-foot concrete pad and laying new asphalt on the remainder of the track and shutdown area. Prior to the 2003 Mac Tools U. S. Nationals, eight new luxury suites were added along the top of the west-side grandstands of the drag strip, giving fans a unique perspective of the action on the famed quarter-mile track. In 2005, new soft barrier walls were added to the oval.
In 2006 the track announced its first track entitlement with O’Reilly Auto Parts. The track – which had been long known as Indianapolis Raceway Park – is now known as O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis.
· O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis (ORP) has been in operation since 1960.
· The first event at ORP was held on the dragstrip in 1960.
· The first oval race was in 1961 on the dirt. A. J. Foyt won that first event.
· The facility was recently renamed O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis following a multiyear, multimillion-dollar sponsorship agreement with O’Reilly Auto Parts.
· ORP is on 267 acres of land and has three racetracks. A .686-mile oval, quarter-mile dragstrip, and 2.5-mile, 15-turn road course make up this multipurpose facility.
· ORP is the home of the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals, the most prestigious drag race in the world. The event is held annually during Labor Day weekend. In 2007, the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals will be celebrating its 53rd anniversary Aug. 29-Sept. 3. Tony Pedregon, John Force, Larry Dixon, Tony Schumacher, and others in the NHRA POWERADE Drag Racing Series will be vying for the most coveted victory in drag racing.
· The 2007 Kroger SpeedFest will take place July 26-28, one week earlier than in previous seasons, and will feature three nights of racing under the lights on the .686-mile oval. On Thursday, July 26, the stars of the USAC Silver Crown Series will take to the track in the J.D. Byrider 100. Past winners of this exciting open-wheel race include A.J. Foyt, Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon, and Ryan Newman. On Friday, racers at the Power Stroke Diesel 200, featuring the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, will bump and bang all the way to victory lane. The weekend will conclude with the 26th annual Kroger 200, a NASCAR Busch Series race. Past winners have included Brian Vickers, Dale Earnhardt Jr., and Greg Biffle.
