Walt Disney World Speedway, with its distinctive “Lake Mickey” retention ponds. Photo courtesy Google Earth.
In 1995, construction of a new one-mile tri-oval race track began on a property just south of Disney World’s parking lots in Orlando, Florida. The track’s opening would coincide with the birth of new open-wheel racing series, the Indy Racing League (IRL), but its glory days would last for just five seasons. Now, 15 years after the venue’s last major motorsport event, Walt Disney World Speedway will be shuttered and razed to make room for planned theme park transportation improvements.
Designed by Indianapolis Motor Speedway chief engineer Kevin Forbes, the Mickyard (as Autoweek dubbed the track in 1995) was built on a shoestring budget. To save construction costs, the facility offered no permanent garages for race teams, instead requiring them to work out of transporters as they would on temporary street circuits. Even the grandstands were temporary fixtures, which permitting the track to erect as many (or as few) bleachers as ticket sales warranted. Parking was in conjunction with Disney World, and, at least initially, the track was marketed in conjunction with the theme park itself.
On January 27, 1996, the IRL debuted the new facility with the Indy 200 at Walt Disney World, a race won by Buzz Calkins, who also managed to turn the fastest lap. A young Tony Stewart, driving for Team Menard, finished second, and the final podium spot was occupied by Robbie Buhl. Attendance was estimated at 50,000, an impressive number for the Mickyard’s first race, and for the next four seasons the 200-mile race at Walt Disney World was a staple of the IRL schedule. In the 1997 season, which began in late 1996, the race was actually the third of the year, but from 1998-2000 the January event signaled the start of open-wheel racing season in the United States.
Richard Petty Driving Experience cars at the speedway. Photo by Nick Traveller.
NASCAR’s Camping World Truck Series visited the track in 1997 and 1998, but by the end of the 2000 IRL season, the Mickyard had lost some of its appeal. Concerned that the Superbowl was pirating viewers who’d otherwise be watching open-wheel racing, the IRL tried to postpone the date of the 2001 event, but the track and the series could never come to terms on a date later in the year. Getting to and parking at the facility had proven to be a nightmare, forcing fans to arrive hours before scheduled events or risk missing the start.
Worse, a series of testing accidents at the track had resulted in serious injuries to star drivers. In January of 1997, Eliseo Salazar broke his back in a turn one crash, and a few weeks later Davy Jones broke his neck. Three years later, in January of 2000, Sam Schmidt was paralyzed in a preseason crash at the speedway, ending his promising career as a driver and very nearly claiming his life. Constructed before the 2002 deployment of the energy-absorbing SAFER barrier (for Steel and Foam Energy Reduction), the track’s concrete walls were unforgiving of mistakes made at speed, and the lack of professional racing at the facility after 2000 meant that significant safety upgrades weren’t cost-effective. Once a favorite of teams for pre-season testing, the track saw fewer such bookings with each passing year.
The Richard Petty Driving Experience set up shop at the Mickyard in 1997, and in 1999 constructed garage facilities and a visitor’s center. The arrive-and-drive a NASCAR stock car venue (or for those who preferred the thrill at lower risk, the arrive-and-ride-shotgun venue) proved so successful that a new element was added in 2011, allowing guests to pilot Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche models on the track at speed. Programs were generally priced by the number of laps, offering something for adrenaline junkies of (almost) all budgets. In 2008 the Indy Racing Experience added the track to its schedule as well, permitting clients to ride along in a two-seat Indy Car, or, with training, drive a single-seater on their own.
The track is scheduled to close for good on June 28, and those with events booked past this date are encouraged to call the respective companies to rebook. It isn’t clear what transportation improvements will be implemented, but those who have visited the Orlando theme park in recent years know that roads and parking lots are usually jammed with visitors, regardless of the season.
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