Community Cares Orange Show Speedway

SAN BERNARDINO, California — – There apparently will be no stock car racing at Orange Show Speedway in 2012.

California Event Management officials Mark and Bonnie Brinksma were informed by e-mail Nov. 23 that the management of the National Orange Show Events Center had “decided to take an alternative route and the track will not be available for next year. There will be no stock car racing at the Speedway next year.”

Mark Brinksma, who had been working with NOS general manager Dan Jimenez and potential sponsors to plan a 2012 season of approximately 20 events, said he and wife Bonnie were stunned when they were informed of the NOS decision in e-mails from Executive Assistant and Board of Directors liaison Maureen Murphy.

The Brinksmas withheld any announcement regarding the speedway to have time to explore their options at OSS and elsewhere in the area and the be sure they could remove all their equipment from the speedway without interference.

Mark Brinksma said he thinks the decision is attributable to the fact the contract CEM signed in February included options for 2012 and 2013. He said “the only way to keep us out was by closing the track,” and in making that decision NOS management has shown “a complete disdain and disregard for the racing community that has supported them for over 60 years.”

If the unilateral decision by NOS management is final and the persistent rumors of racing being curtailed at Irwindale Speedway prove valid, area drivers could be left without a paved oval short-track in 2012.

“We need the racing community to stick together,” Brinksma said. “Orange Show management and the track are not the racing community. We need the racers to stay together and look at moving everything somewhere else, find a place where we can lay out a track and put up some bleachers and go racing.

“It would be grass roots, flat-track racing. It wouldn’t be a case of breaking ground and building a new track, not in this economy. It will take the support of the whole community to pull it off. There are a lot of people in our pits with the knowledge and the equipment it takes to get things done.

“We’ve been talking to some people and we’re looking for areas that might work. We’ll be glad to keep working on it if the racers are interested. We just need to know how they feel and what they think.”

It’s obviously not something the Brinksmas were anticipating when they began planning for next season.

The initial e-mail from Murphy, sent just before 9 a.m. on Nov. 23, said: “It has been roughly four weeks since our meeting and we still have not heard from you regarding the 2012 racing season. I know Dan spoke to Mark and he stated that he needed a couple extra days to speak with sponsors, however that was two weeks ago. With that being said, unfortunately we have decided to take an alternative route and the track will not be available for next year. We would like to thank you for all your hard work this year at the speedway and wish you luck with all your future endeavors. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at the NOS. Have a nice weekend.”

The second e-mail, in response to an inquiry from Bonnie Brinksma, said: “Yes, you are correct. There will be no stock car racing at the Speedway next year.”

Mark Brinksma said that around October 31st he had informed Jimenez they needed to consult with a sponsor who was out of the area before finalizing dates, but that “at no time was there ever a deadline set by NOS for talks about the speedway.” As late as November 10th, Bonnie Brinksma wrote to NOS requesting the list of dates and discussed additional dates.

Orange Show Speedway, on the southern edge of the Events Center grounds, is a banked, paved quarter-mile oval. Its inaugural race was held on May 1, 1947, and it has been used as a motor sports facility without interruption since then. That span of 65 years makes it the oldest continuously-operated track in the state.

In recent years, however, schedules for the next racing seasons at the historic track had not been finalized until December or later. In 2009, the agreement between Rick McCray and NOS wasn’t finalized until mid-February. Again this year, when CEM replaced McCray’s Best in the West Racing, the contract wasn’t signed until mid-February.

For more information, and to let CEM know your thoughts on relocating to a new facility, contact Mark or Bonnie Brinksma by e-mail at CaliforniaEventManagement@hotmail.com. Updates and more information will be available starting tomorrow on our website, www.californiaspeedjams.com.

Source: Jim Short