It was announced during the New London-Waterford Speedbowl banquet on Saturday that the track will add a new division to its regular Saturday night lineup for the 2025 season.
The track will add a new Crown Vic division to most of its Saturday night events in 2025.
Details concerning the new division have not been announced publicly beyond tonight’s banquet.
It means the track will now have eight regular Saturday night divisions. The Crown Vic division joins the SK Modified, SK Light Modified, Late Model, Street Stock, Mini Stock, Truck and Legend divisions as part of most Saturday night cards at the track.
During the banquet festivities track management also released the 2025 schedule.
The 2025 season will begin at the track with Blastoff Weekend May 2-4. The track hosts its Finale Weekend Oct. 3-5.
As announced previously, the Monaco Modified Tri-Track Series will visit the track on Aug. 23.
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FULL 2025 SCHEDULE AT THE NEW LONDON-WATERFORD SPEEDBOWL
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Hard to believe in the old days it was just Modified’s, Sportman and Street Stocks then just SK’s and Street Stocks, then SK’s, Pro Stocks and Street stocks. Now the number of divisions at tracks and across regions watered down by so many choices no wonder car counts struggle. Do you think attendance may struggle in part because tracks waste so much time with video productions like at Stafford, multiple victory lane ceremonies with drivers having to thank everyone right down to Aunt Edna that came to the race not to mention Big Wheel races and other distractions. Where’s the beef?
A full sized class of car isn’t new Riverhead has the Blunderbusts and they’re great to watch. Crown Vic’s reminiscent of the original Street Stocks and a great idea. But it’s entry level so once again a track like Waterford is competing with their own X divisions and to a lesser extent Legends for racers to participate.
Is that what you all want now? Five, six, seven divisions. All heats, anemic car counts, all those victory lane ceremonies with the premier division last in line. And if things go sideways in the support divisions you’re looking at a really long commitment in time.
I thought we mostly came for the premier division. A couple of support divisions to fill out the night but didn’t we mostly come for the big dogs. Apparently that’s no longer the case. Now the priority must be to get as many trophies to racers as possible, get them mic time and make them feel special no matter how watered down the race event becomes. Quantity over quality as it were.
@doug I look at it differently- dwindling car counts lead tracks to create new divisions. SKs were created because the modified divisions were becoming too expensive for local teams. SK lites were created for an even cheaper entry-level option. Those were both decades ago but are the most prominent examples I can think of. In the case of the new Crown Vic divisions popping up, these entry-level stock divisions are made up of older street cars. It’s hard to create fair rules when there are so many different models of old street cars. Luckily there are a LOT of old Crown Vics out there to go around. Some of the teams that are struggling to keep their current car running might be attracted to a potentially cheaper new option.
Doug, I think it’s a matter of many tracks trying to compensate for dwindling front gate tickets by increasing the back gate tickets, trying to come up with entry level classes economical enough (A relative term) to entice more racers as well as fans. As racecar costs spiral upward it eliminates race teams that eventually can no longer afford to race. Race tracks are not going to get large fields of the divisions fans go to see unless there is HUGE $$ up for grabs that pays well down through the fields. From what I’ve seen, Stafford Speedway is the lone exception to the above, and I think that has a lot to do with their marketing expertise. Case in point; it’s the only 5-class pavement track with roughly 100 cars consistently every week.
While the Crown Vic is popular now – it shouldn’t be added to the Saturday card… Too Many divisions too much wasted time JMO
Hopefully, no more than 5 or 6 of the “regular” Saturday night divisions will run on any given Saturday night.
“From what I’ve seen, Stafford Speedway is the lone exception to the above, and I think that has a lot to do with their marketing expertise. Case in point; it’s the only 5-class pavement track with roughly 100 cars consistently every week”
And the expertise to put a well produced evening in HD up on Flo. That’s an important difference. Listen to the production team some Friday on a scanner. It’s like listening behind the scenes to a major network broadcast.
Many of the other Flo broadcasts look like a high school play.
Great points on both sides…. Anything that gets NEW PEOPLE ON THE TRACK AND IN THE PITS IS A WIN WIN ….. as far as the OVERALL View ….for the local track… more people more food more money etc etc. You can’t do anything to these cars except a few things like camber and caster but only as far as mechanical limits and no more… Just spent on Safety stuff and cage and your racing …does really well in Florida..check the rules … real simple..have fun ..see if you like the sport…or no ….
“.for the local track… more people more food more money etc etc.”
Great, if you can have it available to sell.
Food trucks that take 10+ minutes per order, no beer or cocktails, no kiddie snacks, will not bring repeat customers. Losses and risk has to be taken early on to bring ’em back again. The overall experience has to wow first timers.
Not much to watch with these Crown Vic’s, how about joining the SK Lights @ the SK Mod’s together for a open competition 75 Lapper? Now that would entice me to make the 2-hour trek to Waterford, Besides the cold beer and burritos
I doubt anyone from either division would appreciate the increase in laps.
Love watching Brent Gleason’s podcast. Long time Thompson competitor he’s now in the process of building a new Street Stock that he’ll compete with at Stafford this year. He’s old school, does everything himself excepting basic chassis construction and motor. Valuable because it gives those interested in racing an idea of how much is involved as well as providing building tips.
Street Stocks at Stafford now are complete, ground up race cars not even the frame rails need to be OEM any more. The one major performance differentiation with LLM’s is the fact Streets do not have locked rear ends. It’s all so very silly to be building a purpose built race car then hobbling it’s ability to go as fast as the rest of the car is capable with only one drive wheel. With the exception of the skin, rear end and various components they are very similar to LLM’s.
Of all the problems the Speedbowl has one is not providing ample entry level classes to get into racing. No racing is inexpensive but X, Super X and now Crown Vic’s provide something Stafford has long driven away from. An entry level division with the major financial and technical challenges being limited to non-negotiable safety features.
Is there any irony in the fact David Arute has already built a Crown Vic to race complete with roll cage? Perhaps to participate in the 2025 Cleetus McFarland show but wouldn’t it be a hoot to see the car at the Speedbowl?