Management changes made at thompson

[RacnJason00]

THOMPSON, CT. After 21 years of exemplary service, Ben Dodge Jr has left the Thompson International Speedway. Track management confirmed today that Dodge, a long-time leader in race track innovation, first worked at Thompson in the 1970s and returned in the late 1990s after nearly thirty years of running Riverside Park Speedway. During his tenure, Dodge led the track in a new direction and is credited with much of the success of the historic speedway during the last decade.

Dodge worked as a Special Advisor to track owner, Don Hoenig. In making today’s announcement, Hoenig said, “I personally want to thank Ben for his many years of dedicated service and for all of the positive contributions he made to this track. Ben and I have had a great working relationship for well over 30 years and I know that he will be missed by our staff, sponsors, competitors and the entire racing fraternity. I want to wish only the best for Ben in his future endeavors,” Hoenig concluded.

Jonathan Hoenig who is leading the next generation management at Thompson said.”We are looking to enhance and expand the facilities and over all motorsports operations here at Thompson Speedway. With these programs, we are all looking forward to many new changes, advancements in the operations and product offerings to the motorsports community.

Hoenig also said that the Thompson Speedway will be racing on a weekly basis in 2013 and that the complete schedule will be released in the next week to ten days. We will also be releasing our future plans for the expansion and operation of the facility in the very near future. The 2013 rules for racing competition are also just about ready for release

12/21/12

[fastbackss]

Jonathan is not wasting any time - from an e-mail forwarded to me:


All,

With a lot of hard work and support from the motorsport enthusiast community and the tireless efforts of our entire staff, I am thrilled to formally announce that we will once again be hosting road racing events at Thompson Speedway.

First, I would like to thank everyone for their support and patience over these last couple years as we developed final plans to bring back to life the historic road course here at Thompson Speedway. It has been an exciting endeavor and a pleasure to have been able to meet with each of the different groups that are involved in the road racing community. Now, because of these efforts, all the elements for the project have fallen in place.

As soon as conditions allow, we will begin construction in the spring of 2013. We will work throughout the 2013 NASCAR racing season with a final build out set for mid-fall 2013. I must point out that during this time, every effort will be made to minimize disruptions to our NASCAR events and to our customers at the Speedway golf course. Both of these operations will continue to be a part of our sports complex and we look forward to maintaining a high level of commitment to these activities going forward.

With this being said we project to have a full 2014 road racing season. To help everyone plan for our opening and your racing activities, we will begin reserving club rental dates in February 2013 for the 2014 season. You will be notified of the process on reserving these dates soon.

To assist with our communications to the entire motorsports community, we will shortly have a new motorsports park website and blog up and running. This will help keep everyone up to date in real time on the progress of the project throughout the season.

This is an exciting time for everyone at the Thompson Speedway organization and for all of those involved in helping to make our dream of racing again at the oldest road racing facility in the country a reality.

Thank you again for all of your support and have a happy holiday season and a prosperous New Year.


Sincerely,

Jonathan Hoenig

[CASHCAD45]

EXCELENT!! Lets hope this leads to a road course part of the WMT. A two three or four road course mini season would be great, so many historic & exciting venues might be just whats needed to catapult the WMT into the future!!

[csg]

In my opinion, Thompson should get their weekly oval show back on solid footing before working on developing a road course series. I am curious to see how this road course plays out with the already established oval. Just hope they oval series gets just as much attention. As far as the tour on a road course, where the drivers and teams in favor of running road courses? I seem to remember a few of them saying it was a lot of work to change over the cars to make them go right.

[Magicshoes12]

EXCELENT!! Lets hope this leads to a road course part of the WMT. A two three or four road course mini season would be great, so many historic & exciting venues might be just whats needed to catapult the WMT into the future!!

I agree, if the tour goes to Thompson 4 times, make 1 or 2 of them a road course race and have lime rock at the other one in the season....its a shame that these guys went and bought road racing equipment and use it for two years and can't use it anymore! The plans of the place look pretty nice too.

[NWMT PR]

cashcad45 & Magicshoes12 ...

This from the Norwich Bulletin story (http://www.norwichbulletin.com/sports/x1631899866/Thompsons-road-course-plans-wont-impact-oval-racing?zc_p=1#axzz2I5ib17e2) ...

"The road course is not being developed as a race course and although it will certainly be capable of hosting such an event, Hoenig said there are no plans to do so. He said he has received commitments from car clubs who want to rent the facility and also expects to see manufacturers to use it to test cars and for high-performance driving lessons, shooting of commercials and the like."

I would translate that to mean that they aren't planning to run touring series races on the road course, but we'll have to see.


csg ...

There is added work for the team themselves, but many of the driver LOVE road course racing, and are begging for more such events. I've even known drivers to say they'd haul to Canada to race a road course if it was on the schedule.