![]() ![]() But the Racearena lives on in the memories of the people who filled the stands, the drivers who raced there and the sons and daughters whose earliest memories involved watching their fathers roar around the dirt oval. The track, which opened in 1932, closed along with the Danbury Fair after the 1981 season. "The weather is great, and that's a great calling card for us." The stage is a Connecticut Fairgrounds with a one-third of a mile paved oval which hosted Saturday night stock car races for the Southern New York Racing Association."It's going to be a great turnout," SNYRA member Fred Blore predicted, as he and other volunteers attached checkered wristband after checkered wristband to the outstretched arms of the people streaming through the door. An early June evening silence was broken by the growling of racing engines as the track’s Modifieds exited the fourth-turn pit gate. The colorful machines slowly circled the speedway for a few laps before the starter waved the green flag and the cars roared to full speed for their warm-up session. That group exited the racetrack and the next group cycled through the procedure.Ī red, white, and blue colored Gremlin bodied car emerged from the gate and the thousands of S.N.Y.R.A. fans in attendance either cheered with approval or booed with displeasure. In 1976, when the original scene took place, the answer told to me was “Don LaJoie.” #DANBURY RACEARENA REUNION 2017 DRIVER#įor better or for worse, this driver drew the race fans’ attention. In 2017 the answer could be rephrased to state, “Corey LaJoie’s grandfather.”ĭale Earnhardt Jr. ![]() represents many of his father’s fans in NASCAR. Corey LaJoie represents fans of the now-razed Danbury Racearena from two generations ago and the racing LaJoie name. “I’m trying to fly that (S.N.Y.R.A.) flag,” said Corey LaJoie as he prepared for his first Daytona 500. “And try to be the first LaJoie Cup champion. The crowd noise generated when grandpa Don entered the Danbury Racearena’s racing surface was parallel to the reaction of when Dale Earnhardt was introduced. The Fairgrounds grandstand was often occupied by five to seven thousand people. Scale down a 1990s NASCAR Cup race attendance to that number and the passion and energy was about the same for Don. #DANBURY RACEARENA REUNION 2017 DRIVER#. ![]()
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