Dave Grayson

The Orange Show Speedway, OSS, recently released what appears to be a very exciting 2016 season schedule guaranteed to provide a wide variety of racing action for their ever growing legion of race fans. The historic quarter mile paved oval is located within the National Orange Show Fairgrounds in San Bernardino-California. The new racing season officially kicks off on the evening of April 9th and continues until November 5th.

The speedway's Open Late Models and Street Stocks will be two of the major lynch pins of the new OSS schedule. Each division will be making 11 appearances in 2016. The Open Late Models will be treating their fans to 50 lap main events. The lone exception to the lap distance will be the evening of September 4th: the night of the Third Annual Open Late Model 100.

The Street Stocks regular season appearances will feature 30 lap main events. However, they will also be featured on their very own special night, October 15th, with they treat their fans to the Third Annual Street Stock 200.

In still more exciting news, from the new schedule announcement, is the fact that the OSS will be adding a brand new, full time, racing division this season. Those thunder making, ground shaking, OSS Modifieds will treat the speedway's fans to eight appearances this year running 40 lap main events on each night.

Modified racing will also become a major headliner at the OSS on the evening of August 20th when the extremely popular Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series, presented by Loan Mart, comes to town to run one of their always exciting 100 lap features. A true major boon to the OSS from this race is the fact that The Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series will be bringing the element of national television with them. The Lucas Oil Production Studios will be at the speedway that night to record the race for a future airing on the Lucas Oil owned MAV TV. It's also expected that promotions and highlights will also be broadcast, supporting this event, on the recently launched Lucas Oil (Dot) TV.

The long time fan favorite Mini Stocks will be making nine OSS appearances running 25 lap events. Fans will also be treated to eight evenings featuring the youngsters in their small, but very swift, Bandolero cars also running 25 lap mains. The always fun Barber Pole races are scheduled four times this year.

For decades the OSS has frequently treated their fans to top shelf style figure 8 racing and that tradition will continue in 2016 when the Outlaw Figure 8 division makes six scheduled appearances. The division will be headliner for the November 5th season ending event when the OSS presents the Third Annual West Coast Figure 8 Championship, featuring a very intense 300 laps of racing the eight excitement.

When the new schedule was released, the fans were pleasantly surprised to see a very special evening on it. That would be a May 21st visit from the highly acclaimed NASCAR K&N Pro Series West, which is the long time driver development series used to pave the way to opportunities for young drivers to participate in NASCAR's three national touring division including the Sprint Cup. The K&N West will be treating the fans to 150 laps of excitement on this evening during the course of their first appearance at the track since 1978. This event is also a second opportunity for the OSS to benefit from the exposure of national television. The NBC Sports Network will be on hand that night to record the race for a future national broadcast.

All of this OSS excitement is being brought to you by speedway Promoter Rod Proctor and his outstanding staff from HRP: Hot Rod Productions. The group will be officially launching their third season this year and are widely regarded for saving racing at the OSS upon their arrival. The historic track ran its first race back in May of 1947. Some very prominent drivers have crossed the start-finish line over the years including the likes of open wheel racing's A J Foyt and Troy Ruttman, NASCAR West Series champions Herschel McGriff and Jack McCoy along with NASCAR champions Kevin Harvick and Ron Hornaday Jr just to name a few.

However, it appeared that the racing string was about to run out and that's when Proctor and HRP decided to step up, lease the track, and keep the Saturday night lights on. While Proctor was new to the world of promoting racing, he does have some impressive stats on his personal resume that helped out a lot in the process. He's the proprietor of a extremely successful family owned restaurant known as The Green Onion that specializes in Mexican cuisine. That indicates that he is very familiar with the process of dealing with the bottom line that comes with the creation of a very successful business enterprise. Secondly, Proctor has the heart and soul of a racer and is a championship driver in Outlaw Figure 8 racing. That indicates that he fully understands the full process of maintaining a race team and is familiar with the hard work and expenses that come with it.

From the very beginning, Proctor knew that he had to make the OSS budget friendly for both his race teams and the fans who came to see them. He contacted the Kanapolis- North Carolina based Towel City Tires and made them the official tire of the OSS. These tires retail at the track for $90, and often last approximately100 high speed laps, which was a huge improvement over the other major name brands of racing tires that retailed for around $150 each and didn't have anywhere near the lap longevity.

Next, turning his attention to the fans, Proctor lowered general admission ticket prices, age 13 to adult, to $8. Tickets for seniors and kids, age six to 12, are $6 while kids age five and under along with active duty military are admitted free. The track also lowered prices at their concession to make an OSS evening even more budget friendly.

The stage is now set for season number 68 which begins with a series for open practice sessions set for the evenings of March 12th, 19th, 26th and April 2nd. Then on April 9th the fun starts featuring racing from the Open Late Models, Street Stocks, Mini Stocks, Bandoleros, Outlaw Figure 8's and the Barber Pole race.

For more information, dial up the speedway's official website at www.theorangeshowspeedway or follow them on their Facebook page.