Sprintcars: Robbie Paton and Michael Parry on Premier Speedway

Watch: Premier Speedway has widened its track but roughly four metres.

Transcript

00:00 We're here at Premier Speedway, two days out from the January 1 meeting with

00:04 Vice President Robbie Payton and General Manager Michael Parry. A lot of work has been done to the track since Christmas.

00:11 Can you guys explain a little bit about what you've been working on?

00:14 So what we've been doing is we've obviously pulled all the concrete curb and so forth out of the places

00:24 to enable us to widen the racetrack and to try and make it a bit more racy in the evenings.

00:34 It's a hard thing to do, we've had to battle a bit of weather and obviously the rain that we had at Christmas time

00:42 wasn't ideal but to the credit of everyone that's helped us and put in, we've managed to get the place to where we think it'll race well.

00:52 Obviously still an unknown quantity as far as what we're getting but we're happy with where we're at at the minute.

01:00 And Robbie, tell me a little bit about widening the track and how you think it'll be more conducive to better racing?

01:07 Yeah, widening the track has enabled us to alter the track shape.

01:12 So previously with the evolution of the sprint cars, we had quite sharp banking changes or gradient changes

01:21 throughout the surface so widening the track has enabled us to just sort of flatten off some areas.

01:26 It just makes it a little bit more technical for drivers to navigate.

01:31 Can you guys show me a little bit of what you've done to define the racing line now that you don't have the concrete as well?

01:36 So obviously we used to have a concrete curb that would run around the edge of the surface.

01:44 So obviously now all that's gone and we've gone back to a dirt ledge which defines the edge of the racetrack.

01:55 It's not looking real pretty at the moment but like I say we're still working on things and we hope that all the effort by all the volunteers

02:07 and everyone that's helped us is worth it but at the same time it's a work in progress.

02:13 This is the first stage of us as a club trying to rebuild our racetrack.

02:20 And how are you guys feeling about Monday night? Obviously a big night of sprint cars here.

02:24 The start of the really busy summer period with the Classic and Australian title coming up at the end of the month as well.

02:31 I'm not going to lie, I'm nervous. Like I say the weather hasn't done us any favours but this is Warrnambool.

02:40 We have green grass all year round for a reason and that's because it seems to rain all the time.

02:46 We've taken a gamble and we're all in.

02:52 We're trying to make this place better and get it back to where it needs to be as far as a top thing for sprint cars to race in.

03:02 Michael, what sort of crowd are you anticipating on Monday night?

03:05 Traditionally it's always a strong crowd and we're hoping that sort of continues.

03:09 We've got some great car counts, we've got 53 cars nominated so that's all the ingredients there.

03:16 Hopefully the weather is kind to us and we can get a strong crowd in here. We just want to be a great night.

03:22 Alright, thanks guys and best of luck.

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