Figured this might interest a few of the people that drag race out at Fontana at the street legal events. Last weekend I talked with the manager again about the slicks policy and got some good news. At the end of last year they were moving towards implementing a DOT-legal only tire rule. While there are some slicks that have a thing water channel groove that "technically" makes them DOT legal, it would rule out all the other true racing slicks at street legal events and leave most people with only street tires or drag radials as their other options.

She has reversed the decision and as of now they are allowing all racing slicks to be run at the track. If they're not DOT legal you should drive in on street tires for tech but are free to change over once you get to the pits. (You wouldn't want to drive most DOT-legal slicks on the streets anyways for safety reasons.) They may inspect the slicks for general wear and conditions at tech.

When they eventually switch over to night racing they will have to implement the DOT-only rule as well as requiring a muffler (no cutouts, muffler delete, etc.). This is primarily because of strict noise limitation requirements from the county. They want to discourage a lot of the technically street legal cars that are in fact drag-only track cars that happen to have a license plate (such as muscle cars, etc. that are the worst noise offenders) and also want to keep it of a street legal nature to get people off the street and onto the track. I think that's pretty reasonable but now for the other good and not so good news.

They are eventually going to install new lighting for the track, which will allow them to run those night events again. When that does happen they will be moving to weekly racing. Right now with all the other events and rentals at the track that they have limits how many they can run, which is why it can sometimes be a month of three between races. They haven't decided on what night it will be but she said they will more than likely be on a different night than Irwindale as not to compete and take away business from each other. Down side is that due to budgeting the lights won't be happening this year and is realistically still two or three years out in the current economy. That gives everyone some time to run out their current slicks but sucks for not being able to race more often.

Before anyone gets too upset, realize that the lighting assembly, poles, mounting, wiring, installation, etc. isn't cheap and doing the math the drag strip portion of the speedway isn't bringing in the funds that keep the whole facility open. They'd be able to race more if they did have the lights, but I'm sure they've run the numbers and will get to it when they can. Best thing to do is to contact the track president (not just the strip manager) and express your support. The contact info is on their web site.


By the way, the next events are coming up in May. The web site still shows two events, one on the 2nd and the other on the 30th, but they did announce they plan to run three street legals that month.