i learned quick to put my hand over my beer when having to sit low at the corners. good times with cops and robbers, figure 8 and speedway bikes.
The old straight cut tread Firestone Grooved Rears were known as Ascots and had the name moulded into them, I believe.
When my kids were little we used to go to Turkey Night every year. We brought turkey sandwiches and little individual pumpkin pies for our Thanksgiving dinner. Once my photography career started, a group of us shooters would have a pot luck Thanksgiving dinner every year on the tailgate of a truck in the pits. Great times! This photo was shot at the driver's meeting for the last Turkey Night held at Ascot. The two guys in the white circle in the upper right are me and my oldest son. The face inside the red circle in the center of the group is Jeff Gordon. He was still four years away from his first NASCAR Cup race. Also in this photo are guys like Mel Kenyon, Wally Pankratz, Robby Flock, Ron Shuman, Chuck Gurney, Stan Fox, Page and P.J. Jones, George Ito, Jimmy Sills, and about a dozen other guys whose faces I recognize but whose names completely escape me.
Aaaaaahhhhhh.... Gardena! I thought it was Torrance. At least I was close. If that's the place that did figure 8's I remember it well. While in High School (in the summer time between football and baseball season) I worked at an auto parts store in Maywood. We had a guy that worked as a mechanic and on Saturday nights he would race figure 8's and on Mondays he would come in looking like he was in a bar fight and lost! I went with him and a group of guys (and gals, woohoo!) one night and that is when I understood why he looked like he did on Mondays. Tough way to make a couple of bucks!
Ahh, the good old days. Used to sit at the end of the front chute on Saturday nites and read the numbers on the LEFT side of the sprint car tails as they backed 'em into Turn One. Dean Thompson in Bromme's car, Oskie in the JFK car, Ron Shuman in the Tamale Wagon. That's a great group photo of the last Turkey Nite - I was there hanging around Rick Cresse's pit and he became the last guy to flip at Ascot that nite, a dubious honor I suppose.
I used to take my son and one of his friends a couple of times a month. They loved the figure 8 races and the demolition derby at the end of the night. We allways stunk from oil and burnt rubber when we got home. We went on the 4th of July a couple of times, they had a great fireworks show.
I remember him with his big gl***es too when I lived in Long Beach. every Sunday, and someone named wild Bill was the one to beat......Used to go to ASCOT to watch mortorcyle flat tracking and Splinters too............... Err I mean sprinters........
Thats where I spent most of the time. My mom, divorced and single, would take us there, for the heat races, then go to that bar up the road, and hang out with the racers, have a beer, while we sat in the car. There was a great legend there, Ivan Baldwin, who had a little Mickey Mouse statue glued to his back package tray on his 07 stock car, flippen you the 'bird!! Ah, to be born and raised in SoCal. Such a treat!!! *****in memories of riding in the bed of the pace truck on the flag salute parade laps, they'd stop at the front stairs,and load as many kids as they could for that!!
####---Ascot cool *** place !! Ron Shuman gave me a racin tip once. ""He said when you drive a Sprint car it's When you Flip Not If"" !! >>>>.
And that is the truth - For several years, the oft-repeated Jimmie Oskie story was that he had never flipped a car, even though he had been around for a while and in fact had won the CRA chanmpionship for Don Blair. When he finally did flip for the first time, he did it up right, launching it through a billboard and into a motorhome behind the back stretch. Sounded to me like his foot was still full on the throttle as he flew through the sign.
I went to a CRA race there in the early 80s ... my old roommate's grandparents (Bill & Evelyn Pratt) were a bit of a fixture at Ascot Park ... it was a great track ... Wingless Sprint Car racing at its best!
I remember Ivan Baldwin would show up at Riverside and run with the Big boys of NASCAR, in a Nova I think, and kick some serious ****. He also ran it with the IMSA boys there. Watching him and Herschel McGriff was very entertaining
My Grandfather and Grandmother are both buried across the street from the old Gardena Speedway...**** Lane KTLA 5 ..he was SO Ca sprint car racing. My Grandmother used to drive to Olympic Aud. from Compton to Boxing Matches and LA T-bird games...The live races at Gardena were spectacular, so were the crashes...
I'll never forget after a particularly violent flip coming out of turn 4 the announcer saying "would the owner of a brown El Camino and a Blue Chevy parked along the fence, please report to your cars immediately" That and the sight of a Sprint Car hanging on the fence in turn one and them using the bucket of a skip loader to get it down. Ahhh, Good Times.
I remember watching sprint cars as a kid there and after the races, going down on the track with my friends seeing who could collect the most tear-offs. On a side note, my brother was named Colby after Colby Scroggins who ended up being the flag man at Ascot after his driving carrer ended if I remember correctly.
Wow.. more memories.... Good ol JC Agajanian, I grew up in Lakewood just down the 91 a couple miles. I had a friend the raced sprints and I would meet him in the parking lot and ride in on the back of his trailer...free p***. We got kicked out of slick track a few times, that was fun place. for thoes who don't know what that was...go karts, 5hp honda motors I belive, and concret track that's polished and they put baby powder in the corners, bump the guy next to you and he goes in circles.... ha ha Roach
My Dad raced there that's his # 88 The announcer was **** Lane, his catch phrase was "whoa nelllllie"
I went all the time with my friends dad,Rich Lenarz. Went many nights watching the flat track guys! Dave Aldana,Eddie Daroucio,Damon Daroucio. When I was little,I was one of those kids who would slide down the hill at the end of the stands on cardboard...Great memories!!! We went for the "Last Race". I really hoped it would open back up. Over by my house on the other side of the Long Beach frwy,there was Trojan Speedway. You could hear the racing from my house!!!
Trojan speedway was a great little track.They ran friday nights, T Q 's Alot of the guys from there went on to Ascot gardena etc. Ihave some pics,from back then but i have to get my friend to help post them.
I remember going to watch speedway motorcycle racing there, neat place. I at least got to be there. CBB
I drove by there last year ,and surprizingly it was still there !!! there was however ,some earthmoving going on in the parking lot area. you could still see the sign wall from the 110 fwy .
Yep, used to go there alot. Went to the last Sprint Car Event there, still have the Program....couldn`t get to the last Race tho...I hear there were people carrying off anything they could after Racing was done as souvenirs...
ascot was my lullaby. i was a drag racing kid. never knew anything else. but i LOVE the sound of engines. ascot was a few miles down the road. i would listen to the races from my bed and the sound of the engines would put me to sleep. when i was about 19 they had the last race. i didn't make it but my buddy did and he s****ed up a few mason jars full of track surface.
I remember going to a Sprint car race , there were all these great seats empty down close to the first corner .... Ummm lets go sit there, close to the action ..... Well we soon found out why those seats were empty , picking dirt clods out of our hair ! Beaulieu
Then---------Along came the Freeway system!!!---They pushed Artesia blvd. right thru center of the track, making a 4 lane Hwy. East & West. Even so, you could still see the black striped wall on the South side traveling on Artesia. Remember when Troy Ruttman (sponsored by "trash king" J.C.Agajanian) was the favorite in sprint cars??----He went on to win INDY in 1952.-----------Don
I saw a sprint car race for the first time at Ascot; that was in 1987. One of my co-workers is Gary Howard; I believe he had the track record for a while. I'm pretty sure he also managed to flip into the parking lot one time as well.
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