Subject: [Fot] Thompson Speedway progress pictures

From: George Harmuth <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 2013 09:06:16 -0500 ZX853FP2HF5|February, 2013) at 11/18/2013 09:06:17

Several Historic Racing Group members attended the SCCA NER conference
Saturday at Thompson Speedway in Ct. For those of you who haven't heard,
Thompson, which has a long history as a race venue, has only been using the
paved oval track at the facility for years. The old road course was not
used and had fallen into disrepair. Last year it was announced they they
were converting the site to a drivers club and they have revived and
updated the 1.7 mile road course. The project is funded and proceeding
forward, a good deal of the work has been started with the first race
scheduled for next July as a combined VRG - VSCCA event. SCCA will also
have a few events next year too.

 We were broken up into 4 groups and given a track walk, my group's guide
was Mike Rand, who was the GM at Limerock for years and still active racer.
Although I didn't have my camera with me when I took the walk, I was able
to drive around the track afterwards and take some pictures.

Pictures Here Click on a picture and use the arrows on the right and left
to scroll through them.

New track map here

>From my drive around I wasn't able to get any shots of the big sweeper,
turn 4 that will take you under a new paddock access bridge and into the
oval area. The Oval section of the track will not use any of the banking,
the track is too rough, but will be a new section of pavement added to the
lower inside of the oval, through turns 3 and 4 and exit to the viewing
berm (must be 25 feet high, will be a great spot to watch from) just before
turn 2 of the oval.

The track looks like it will be fun to drive, fair amount of twisty parts
and some technical areas that should make good passing zones.

This looks like it's being built right, with input being requested from the
SCCA and other experts, for things like flag station locations and the best
way to configure the paved areas for efficient use.

One good thing for the big bore guys is, as of now, there are no noise
limits. A track has existed here since the 40's and is grandfathered in.
That may change, but for now it's good news.

mike h

63 spit race car

G. Michael Harmuth
Software Engineer
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