WHERE IT’S FROM
An Olympic-sized pool is 3,300 cubic yards. Picture the volume of seven pools. That’s the amount of dirt Bristol Motor Speedway placed around its .533-mile concrete oval to turn it into a dirt track for the first time in two decades.
A better but maybe more difficult visual: It equals 149,851 kegs of beer.
Regardless, the grand total came out to be more than 23,000 cubic yards of dirt.
“It sounds so simple,” said Steve Swift, Speedway Motorsports senior vice president of operations and development. “Doesn’t it?”
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To find the right dirt in anticipation of this weekend’s NASCAR visit, Swift and his team of internal personnel and outside contractors tested more than 20 different sites and sent those samples out to a group of geotechnical engineers in California who specifically study and understand dirt meant for racing. Luckily for Bristol, there was quality red clay right in northeast Tennessee — home of the speedway.
Three different sources were chosen: the old dirt-track leftovers from 2000-01, an area just 10 minutes away in Bluff City and then literally the top of a hill at the nearby Gentry Campground, which actually helped level out space for more campsites.
Turned out, the latter two spots consisted of untouched dirt. Perfectly pure, which meant it was time to start moving the goods.
“We actually used spoons and little five-gallon buckets, like what you take to the beach when you build sandcastles,” Swift said. “No, I’m really joking. We used very large equipment.”
Excavators. Pans. Bulldozers. Dump trucks.
“Like a little boy’s toy box, but on a bigger scale,” Swift said.
Bristol started construction on Jan. 11 and had cars on track Feb. 25. That’s less than two months. In reality, though, the transportation and transformation groups only worked 14 days during that span because of rain, snow or cold temperatures.
The compound does have lights, so that allowed around-the-clock movement when the weather did cooperate.
“It varied from day to day,” Swift said. “Basically we used anywhere from eight to 12 trucks. But that would mean in a day’s time we were averaging anywhere from 1,200-1,800 yards a day, which would be 120-180 truckloads a day.”
Good for more than 2,000 truckloads of dirt total.
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First, about two inches of saw dust went down. The old Bristol stockpile then formed the dirt base; its clay contents were no longer the best but helped with filling. The campground dirt began the fresher cover, topped by lime-treated clay and then the Bluff City raceable dirt on top.
Global Satellite Positioning (GPS) equipment on the bulldozer and graders placed the dirt in proper locations. In the turns, 9-10 feet of dirt changed the banking from the corner’s usual 28 degrees to 19. The width of the racing surface gained 10 feet, now measures 50 feet wide.
“There is going to be some carnage, some sparks, beating and banging,” former NASCAR driver and current FOX Sports analyst Clint Bowyer said. “But show me a dirt race that’s never had that. Show me a good dirt race that’s never had that.”
WHERE IT’S GOING
After all that beating and banging, the checkered flag will fall. A winner will be crowned. And the dust will literally settle.
Then what? Bristol can’t remain a dirt track. It’s set to host NASCAR for its annual night race in September on the concrete.
“As crazy as it sounds, it’s a lot easier to deconstruct than it is to construct,” Swift said. “Because you’re not worried about compaction or exact placement. You’re just — for lack of better terms — hogging dirt or massing the dirt out. You’re just worried about picking it up, putting it in the truck and getting it off the property.”
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Mixing the three different layers of dirt doesn’t matter, so that also eliminates what could have been a very tedious step.
Bristol plans to keep the dirt on speedway grounds for easier future use — potentially NASCAR, though talks of a second go-around are dependent on this weekend’s success. With help and advice from the geotechnical engineers, the team handling the dirt knows what treatments can be done in storage to replenish important nutrients.
“It’s like baking a cake,” Swift said. “We got to make sure we have all the ingredients. When we go to the store, we’ll make sure we put all of those ingredients back in it. As it sits and decomposes and rests for a year, all those things are back in it when we go to place it again.”
Even that’s not going to be the most difficult part.
As cars race, they’re going to fling particles quite literally all over the venue. It’s inevitable. The track surface itself will be the easiest part to clear off, and no damage will be sustained. Instead, the lights, grandstands, support structure, air filters, HVAC units, concession stands, etc. are at risk and will require extensive cleaning.
“Last time we pressure washed this place four times from top to bottom,” said Jerry Caldwell, Bristol’s executive vice president and general manager. “We’ve got some pressure washers lined up ready to go.”
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Swift and Caldwell estimate the clean-up process will take about a month, starting as soon as the final dirt series events wrap in April. The main concern then quickly switches to having the facility back in unsoiled operating condition for NASCAR fans in September.
They’ll surely have a different experience than those bound to get dirty Sunday, that’s for sure. This has been a not-so-simple project for all parties involved.
“It’s funny,” Swift said. “We know a lot about dirt from a construction stance — how to build buildings on it, what it needs to look like for those types of things. But to understand how dirt should react when you’re running a race on it and how race cars affect it, I never dreamed that would be something I’d take on in such a short timeframe.”
