If you are looking for a great and exciting time for the whole family, you can’t beat the excitement and value of what the Greenville Speedway offers most Saturday nights this summer and fall.
For just $10 for adults and $5 for children and seniors (kids 6-and-under get in free), right here in Greenville you can feel the roar of the engines, the smell of burning rubber, and the adrenaline rush you get from watching the speedy machines push to their limits. Upcoming races include the MS Crate Late Model Series (June 22), the Street Stock Special Series (July 6) and the Hurricane ASCS Sprint Cars (July 13). Each of these three nights will be packed full of action.
The racing begins each night at 7. p.m.
“If you have never been, you need to come check it out,” said Carl Kilgore who manages the track with his wife Charity. “It is a family oriented-event. You and your husband and kids can come out and sit around and watch the excitement. You got guys driving around this racetrack at 110 to 115 miles per hour making a corner. The little kids get into that. The family gets into that. When there is a crash or the cars tear up, it is pretty exciting. You can’t go to the movies for what we charge. Here you will have four to five hours of entertainment.”
It takes a labor of love for the Kilgores to host an event each weekend. Despite the couple owning and operating the Elite Glass company in town, the two spend countless hours preparing for race night. The Kilgores have leased the Speedway, which has been around since the 1970s, from Washington County for the last six years. It’s Carl’s job to maintain the Gumbo-Dirt track and other maintenance around the speedway. Charity takes care of the paper work and expenses. The couples three children, Carl Kilgore, Clayton and Cathryn are race car drivers at the Greenville Speedway as well.
“If we didn’t spend our time out here to get this thing prepared than people to come and watch the race or have something to do on a Saturday night than there is no telling where they will be or where they will go,” Carl said. “I would give them my life story. When I was growing up, I wasn’t into racing or anything like that. I would go out and go to bars and get into trouble. Now that I have got into racing and my kids into racing since, the discipline they have learned through racing has carried into life to make them better people. They look forward to doing this every Saturday night instead of getting into trouble.
The 1/4 mile Gumbo Oval at the Speedway is considered by many as the fastest dirt track in the south. The track gets the name Gumbo because of it sticky black mud which is ideal for great racing.
Like an expert greenskeeper at a golf course, Carl has to fine tune the dirt on the track each week.
“It is hit and miss. We may have a really good racetrack this week and next week it may be a little slicker because we didn’t get a lot of water on it. Mother nature has a lot to do with it. If the sun is beaming down on it, it is harder to get it right . A cool day like today is not as tough, because we don’t use as much water. The rain changes what we do to the racetrack to get prepared for the race.”
Because of the work of the Kilgores, the local economy sees a boost each week with drivers from all over the region coming into Greenville to spend their money.
‘That is exactly why we do this. We have Arkansas drivers who would rather come here on a weekly race than they would stay in Arkansas or Louisiana. We got them who come every weekend from Jackson. On our bigger events, like the Gumbo Nationals in the fall, they come from all over, from Florida, Tennessee Alabama, just everywhere.”
Greenville Speedway Upoming Events
June 22 MS Crate Late Model Series
July 6 Streetcar Stock Special
July 13 Hurricane ASCS Sprint Car
July 20 Weekly Racing Series Event
July 27 Weekly Racing Series Event
August 3 MSCCS Super Late Models
• Races begin at 7 p.m.
• Tickets — Adults $10; Children $5; Seniors $5; Kids Under 6 Free
