Daytona Track News and Announcements

Track News and Announcements

• Daytona finishes upgrading SAFER around track: When drivers race at Daytona International Speedway over the next few weeks, they'll notice that all outside and inside walls on the track's 2½-mile tri-oval, with the exception of pit lane, will have energy-absorbing barriers. It was nearly a year ago when Kyle Busch slammed into an unprotected concrete wall on the inside going toward Turn 1, breaking his right leg and left foot. Busch didn't race again for nearly three months after the Feb. 21 accident but rallied to win the 2015 Sprint Cup title. In reaction to that accident, DIS President Joie Chitwood pledged that night to have all walls covered by SAFER (steel-and-foam energy reduction) Barrier as soon as possible. When NASCAR teams returned in July, there were still some non-covered walls on the insides of the turns and the backstretch. DIS officials had been criticized for being slow to add more SAFER Barrier while spending $400 million on a new project to turn its grandstands into a modern stadium. Lesa France Kennedy, CEO of DIS parent company International Speedway Corp., said ISC tracks have added 54,000 linear feet of SAFER Barrier in the past year. ISC operates 12 of the 23 tracks where the Sprint Cup Series races. Virtually all tracks have added more SAFER Barrier in the past year, an issue brought to the forefront by Busch's injury as well as NASCAR's newly formed Sprint Cup drivers council.(ESPN.com)(1-28-2016)
  
• Daytona International Speedway Officially Opens New Motorsports Stadium: To celebrate the completion of a massive 2.5 year, $400 million reconstruction, it took a couple of huge pairs of scissors for Lesa France Kennedy and Jim France to cut a ribbon marking the official reopening of Daytona International Speedway's grandstand complex. The Wednesday afternoon ribbon cutting marked a "new chapter" for the Speedway, said France Kennedy, CEO for International Speedway Corporation, which owns the track her grandfather built in 1958. "It's also going to usher in a new era for the future of motorsports," she said. "We're opening the first true motorsports stadium and that speaks volumes about how far this sport has come and where we see our future heading."
  It boasts a host of new amenities, including 1,400 video monitors, enhanced technology, modernized bathrooms and new food and drink vending areas. The original narrow seats were one of the first things to go, replaced with wider seats complete with cup holders. But, the one thing Speedway President Joie Chitwood III said he's proudest of are the new escalators that allow fans to get all the way to the top of the 101,500-seat grandstand area with a minimum of walking. The escalators, which the Speedway started using for races last year, have been wildly popular with fans. Even though Chitwood said they'll still be "tweaking things" behind the scenes over the next couple of weeks, fans will get their first look at the finished facility during this weekend's Rolex 24 at Daytona.(Daytona Beach News Journal)(1-28-2016)