The Road Course @ Thompson Speedway

Looks like they have some renovating going on down in Connecticut. Plan is to open the road course in 2014.

Whaddya think?

I think I'm signing up to drive there. Our autocross club has run on what is left of the old road course for a few years. It's bumpy as heck, but fast as heck. They are planning to make a modern, safer, course for rental purposes, and still retain the oval for their regular series. We "drove" the course outline this summer on bikes, it should be fun. And the ice cream at Bogies has to been eaten to be believed.

Always nice to have another road course.

Way back when, they included the oval,much as they plan to do now. Then they redid the course without the oval.

Glad to see they are redoing it.

I fully support this, though it appears that the new course will consume the entire parking area.

in car from a autocross there. We used what left of the old road course

http://youtu.be/Xao3ShFGG5E

Yeah, it's that bumpy. The camera was on a IO/port mount on the harness bar of the roll bar.

I forget where else I saw it but it mentioned SCCA and PCA among others as users. SCCA had intended to have a road course in Palmer MA. Last I knew that was stalled. Wonder if this is plan B, or is Thompson just trying to fill a perceived need in the area?

Went to the palmer site and the last update on there is 2011-02-01. That track and all the $$$$$ spent by my local chapter of SCCA is why I bailed out of SCCA. Rates keep going up, there news letter became a POS (funding going to make payments on the track). I was really anoyed by them at the time. It just seemed like a project destined to fail and it was going to bankrupt the local SCCA region to boot.

From Thompson Speedway's Facebook page:

"Thank you for all of your positive comments and support toward the re-paving and re-opening of the historic road course here at Thompson. We were planning on putting out a more formal press release next week with the accompanying image after we release our 2013 racing schedule and rules. The info that is being passed around in in fact true and did come from us. It was distributed to all the clubs, groups and schools that have worked with us to develop this plan and go through feasibility over the past two years. To clear up a couple things in the comments below. The venue, when used as a road course, will be primarily for club events, i.e., PCA, BMW, SCCA, etc, high performance driving schools, corporate outings, testing, etc. Our primary goal is to re-pave the historic course, upgrade degraded asphalt, safety barriers and overall facilities and amenities. When there are oval racing events the track will transform back to the traditional oval configuration. Parking will take place the same as it does now during oval events. Again, we will be releasing more on the facility upgrades and r-paving project over the next couple weeks. Any questions or concerns please message the facebook page and we will contact you personally."

Considering Palmer appears to be stalled indefinitely, Thompson made the right move at the right time.

I grew up in Thompson and used to ride my bicycle on the old road course. That track was in horrible shape twenty years ago. Much of the area is swamp, but the track was mostly there. Glad to see an attempt at rebuilding it being made. Now, if the smart people at the speedway would build a proper drag strip, Thompson would be THE motorsports center of the northeast.

Yeah this is going to be great, i can't wait.

I live about 15 mins away, and drove by yesterday, looks like some activity at the main entrance and my contacts at the track say full re-paving to start in a few weeks. Apparently many car clubs have already committed to doing driving events there. Looking forward to it!

There is a new road course in NYS. NYSafety Track. It is built on a mountain top at the site of an old airport. Not far from Oneonta. The course is 2.1 miles, due to open in May 2013.

As for Thompson, this will be their third road course. The new one will use parts of both old ones. Crewed at both of the old tracks.