Auto Club Speedway

On April 20, 1994, Roger Penske and Kaiser Steel announced the construction of a race track on the abandoned site of the Kaiser steel plant in Fontana, California. The day after the announcement, CART announced that it would hold an annual race at the speedway. Three months later, NASCAR president Bill France Jr. agreed to penalize NASCAR Cup Series races at the racetrack after they have finished. It was the first time NASCAR committed to racing at a track that had not yet been built. Community meetings discussed issues related to the construction of the trail and the local effects of the events. The local community mostly supported the construction of the highway, citing the possible increase in land values ​​and the rejuvenation of the community. In April 1995, the project was unanimously approved by the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors (Sano Bernardino County Board of Supervisors) after it passed a sister track to Michigan International Speedway. The California Environmental Protection Agency gave Penske permission to begin construction after Emperor agreed to pay $6 million to remove the hazardous waste. Construction began on November 22, 1995, when the Kaiser steel plant was demolished. A landmark on the Kaiser property, the 100-foot (30 m) tall water tower was left in the center of the field to act as a scoreboard. 3,000 cubic meters (2,300 m3) of contaminated dirt was removed and transported to a toxic landfill. A non-porous polyethylene cap was placed on the surface and covered with 0.61 m of clean soil to prevent residual contaminants from rising. The construction of the track was completed at the end of 1996. On January 10, 1997, Marlboro Team Penske driver Paul Tracy became the first driver to test at the new motor track. NASCAR held its first open test session at the track on 5-7. may The official grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony was held on June 20, 1997, and the first race, a NASCAR West Series race, was held the following day.

Auto Club Speedway, originally opened as California Speedway, is a 2,000-mile (3,219 km) long D-shaped oval superspeedway located near Fontana, California in unincorporated San Bernardino County. It has hosted NASCAR races every year since 1997. It was also previously used in open wheel racing. The racetrack is located 76 kilometers east of Los Angeles and near the former locations of Ontario Motor Speedway and Riverside International Raceway. The track is owned and operated by NASCAR. The expressway is served by nearby Interstate 10 and Interstate 15 freeways, as well as a Metrolink station behind the crest. Construction on the site of the former Kaiser steel plant began in 1995 and was completed in late 1996. The main auditorium capacity of the race track is 68,000, plus 28 sky boxes, for a total capacity of 122,000. In 2006, a fan area was added behind the main auditorium. The lights were added to the race track in 2004 during the second weekend of NASCAR. Since 2011, the track has hosted only one NASCAR weekend per year. IndyCar previously ran the 500-mile event under Champ Car sanctions from 1997 to 2002. Current IndyCar sanctions previously ran the 400-mile race from 2002 to 2005 and the 500-mile race from 2012 to 2015, usually the season finale. Its last IndyCar race was the chaotic 2015 MAVTV 500. Don’t forget to check out this place in Fontana too.

The track was named California Speedway from its construction until February 21, 2008, when the Automobile Club of Southern California purchased the naming rights under a 10-year contract; thus the track became Auto Club Speedway and has remained so since 2022, when the contract was renewed. After the early success of the track’s opening, the Speedway began expanding the reserved grandstand seating up front, adding 15,777 seats. In May 1999, a further 28 skyboxes were added to the top of the main stand. In 2001, the Auto Club Dragway, a 1/4-mile obstacle course, was built behind the main race track. In the same year, the infield of the expressway was restructured into a universal road course. On April 24, 2003, the San Bernardino County Planning Commission approved a modification of the motorcycle track’s conditional use permit to allow for the installation of lights around the track. Later that year, NASCAR announced a second annual NASCAR Cup Series race at the track for the 2004 season, with the second race being run “under the lights”. NASCAR ran two race weekends each year until 2011, when the track returned to one annual race weekend. In 2006, half of the racetrack behind the main pole was renovated. The new midway, called “Discover IE FanZone”, includes Apex (Wolfgang Puck’s restaurant), additional shade and lounge areas, retail and an entertainment stage. In March 2014, Las Vegas-based Exotics Racing expanded to California with the opening of a new 1.2-mile road course at Auto Club Speedway. Auto Club Speedway is the place to be if you love to race and want to go for a few laps or compete with friends and family. The racetrack here is famous as the home of the Xfinity, IndyCar Series and NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. The track is located at the site of Fontana’s other famous landmark, the Kaiser Steel Works, and you can come here and choose from a variety of packages, all of which will speed you around the track. If you are ever in need of home renovation, click here.