Southside Speedway - Attendance

Attendance

Southside Speedway has gone through a roller coaster of variations in attendance over the years. At times, Southside Speedway has struggled and survived many years of near shut-down, and at other times Southside Speedway packs the stands every Friday night. During the early 1980s, attendance was an issue as the track found it difficult to find cars to race, and would often jump through hoops to provide extra incentive for fans to show up. Around this time, the track was condemned by Chesterfield County because of serious safety hazards associated with the old wooden grandstands. The stands were upgraded in 1983. In the late 1980s however, the track was fitted with newer aluminum grandstands that could hold twice as many fans and there was promise for a next generation to begin.

Despite these changes, Southside Speedway was rumored to be replaced by a shopping mall in 1987-88. There were even talks of building a new track to replace it in neighboring Dinwiddie County.

In the early 2000s, there was talk of possibly lengthening the track, but ultimately the decision was made to keep it the way it was.

When Denny Hamlin came from Southside and landed in the Sprint Cup series, fans all over Richmond who have jumped on the bandwagon have caused a resurgence of attendance at Southside. In 2007, Denny Hamlin came to Southside on a Thursday night on the week of the May Sprint Cup race at Richmond International Raceway and Southside saw the best attendance it had seen in years. The following year, Denny Hamlin brought Joe Gibbs teammate Kyle Busch to the track to race in a special 175-lap Late Model Sportsman event to benefit the newly founded Denny Hamlin Foundation. Kyle Busch won that race after Denny Hamlin was sent to the rear of the field early in the event after an incident involving Billy Morris. The race put Southside Speedway in the national spotlight as the event was talked about that weekend during coverage of racing, qualifying and practice for the ensuing races at RIR on Speed and FOX.