One of the factors that make South Boston Speedway a great place for competitors to race is the speedway’s long-standing tradition of being one of the safest short tracks in NASCAR.
In its continuing effort as an industry leader in safety, South Boston Speedway hosted an afternoon-long training class on Saturday, February 26 involving South Boston Speedway Track Services personnel and 16 members from the Cluster Springs, Virginia Volunteer Fire Department which is the track’s emergency services provider this season.
Also participating were South Boston Speedway Hornets Division competitor Kevin Currin of Chase City, Virginia, Must See Racing sprint car series competitor Anthony Linkenhoker of Louisa, Virginia who brought his sprint car to be used in the training class and Brent Seelman, the competition director for the Must See Racing sprint car series.
“Our training event went extremely well thanks to the great participation on the part of everyone involved,” said South Boston Speedway General Manager Chase Brashears. “There can never be too much training. Everyone involved here – from our race officials to track services members and our emergency medical provider – want to provide expert care to all of our participants.”
The training session covered many topics including situations pertaining to sprint cars, which will be featured in a special two-night event at the speedway in late April.
“We thank everyone who gave their time and resources to this training,” Brashears said. “We reviewed the basics of racetrack safety, how to deal with each individual car that competes here across the course of the season and closed out with a real-world scenario.”
Cluster Springs Volunteer Fire Department Chief Chris Hudson said he was extremely happy to have the opportunity for fire department personnel to participate in the training class.
“We learned a lot,” Hudson pointed out following Saturday’s training session.
“I’m all about making sure everybody is on the same page. There are a lot of driver safety equipment items in place that you need to see and learn about. This training helps us a lot to be able to better protect and provide care to the drivers, crew members and track personnel during an event. We can also use this training in the field on our day-in and day-out calls for incidents on the highway.”
Hudson said the training with the sprint car and learning how to extricate a driver from a sprint car was both interesting and important.
“I’ve never seen a sprint car up close in person,” he remarked. “It was great to be able to see one and learn about its inner workings. That was definitely a great help to all of us.”
Seelman said he and the officials of the Must See Racing series are always interested in working with tracks to improve safety.
“We thoroughly appreciate seeing and working with tracks that take an active interest in the safety of their competitors,” Seelman said. “It makes everyone feel a lot more comfortable knowing that good safety practices and safety services are in place.”
The training course concluded with participants being put through a full real-world scenario that involved the use of multiple skills including fully cutting open a racecar, rendering medical aid and extricating a driver.
“We greatly appreciate the support of everyone involved in this training, and the hard work our track services and operations staff put in to make this training the huge success that it was,” Brashears said. “We strive to over prepare when it comes to safety and emergencies and this training was an important tool in that.”
The latest news and updates from South Boston Speedway are available on the speedway’s website, southbostonspeedway.com, and through the track’s social media channels. Information may also be obtained by phoning the speedway at 434-572-4947 or toll free at 1-877-440-1540 during regular business hours.
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