New Hampshire Motor Speedway

Twice each year, in July and September, the little New England town of Loudon, N.H., becomes the racing capital of the United States.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway brings around 100,000 NASCAR fans to its grandstands and VIP suites to see the stars of the Sprint Cup Series compete on the 1.058-mile oval.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway also hosts competition in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series; the Busch Series, North Division and the Modified Tour, and every car that takes to the track’s unique shape and configuration finds it challenging.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway has been described as “Martinsville on steroids,” and the similarities are apparent. Like Martinsville, New Hampshire Motor Speedway features a pair of long straightaways connected by narrow, relatively flat turns.

The 65-foot-wide straightaways, each 1,500 feet long, are banked at only 2 degrees. The turns, each 92 feet wide, are banked at 12 degrees and have a 375-foot radius measured on the inside.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway is the pride of the Bahre family, whose roots in New England racing go back to 1964 when Bob Bahre purchased a speedway in Oxford, Maine, which he and his son, Gary, operated until 1986.

The Bahres’ efforts to bring a major racing facility took off in 1989 when ground was broken for New Hampshire Motor Speedway on a site about 10 miles north of New Hampshire’s capital city, Concord.

The track opened its gates for the first time in June 1990 and played host to its first NASCAR touring series event, the Budweiser 300 for Busch Series cars. The Cup series followed in July 1993, with Rusty Wallace getting the victory.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway was the first superspeedway built in the United States since 1969. It has the most room for ticket buyers of any sports facility in New England and, in July 2000, became the first place to ever draw more than 100,000 sports fans for a single day event.

Over the course of a given year, more than 600,000 spectators buy tickets to see races at New Hampshire Motor Speedway each year.

Jeff Burton is the career leader with four Cup victories at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, which hosted one Cup event per season from 1993 until 1996 and since then has had two dates per season.

Burton’s list of victories at New Hampshire Motor Speedway includes the Dura Lube 300 in 2000 in which Burton started on the outside of the front row and jumped immediately to the lead on the green flag. Burton led every one of the 300 laps that day to get that victory.

In 2004, New Hampshire Motor Speedway played host to the first race in the inaugural Chase for the Sprint Cup and played a key role in how that battle for the championship played out. Tony Stewart, Ryan Newman and Jeremy Mayfield were involved in a wreck that put an early dent in their championship hopes, while Kurt Busch - who had won the July race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway as well - completed a season’s sweep that propelled him toward the 2004 Sprint Cup championship.