| House of Drift | |
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Irwindale Speedway as it was prepared for the 2006 Toyota Allstar Showdown |
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| Location | Irwindale, California |
| Time zone | GMT-8 |
| Capacity | 6,500 without portable seating |
| Opened | 1999 |
| Former names | Irwindale Speedway |
| Major events | NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown NASCAR Camping World West Series Whelen All-American Series |
| Surface | Asphalt |
| Length | .5 mi (.804 km) |
| Turns | 4 |
| Banking | 6°, 9°, 12° (progressive) |
Toyota Speedway at Irwindale is a motorsports facility located in Irwindale, California, United States. It features banked, paved 1/2- and 1/3-mile oval tracks and a 1/8-mile drag strip. It opened on March 27, 1999, as Irwindale Speedway and held that name until Toyota purchased the naming rights to the facility in 2008.[1] From it's opening until 2011 it was mainly used for NASCAR races such as NASCAR K&N Pro Series West and Whelen All-American Series events. In late 2011, NASCAR announced it was dropping Toyota Speedway from it's schedule. It is rumored the racetrack was close to filing bankruptcy.
From 2003 to 2010, the main 1/2-mile oval hosted the NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown. In this event, the top 30 drivers in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series and the top 40 drivers in the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series come from their respective regional tours to compete in a "best-of-the-best" race. The races were televised live on the Speed Channel. It was also the home of the Turkey Night Grand Prix race, a Thanksgiving midget car racing tradition in southern California since 1934, when the race debuted at Gilmore Stadium. Among the 2005 participants were Tony Stewart, Jason Leffler, and J. J. Yeley. It was also seen in an episode of Malcolm in the Middle, titled "Stock Car Races" and also used in the opening scene of the pilot episode of Fastlane.
In 2010, they hosted the first Lucas Oil California Classic on Thanksgiving weekend. This was a two-day (Actually 3 due to rain on Saturday night) event for the Spears SRL Southwest Tour, Super Late Models, and Late Models. They will run 125, 100, and 75 laps respectively, for a $50,000+ purse.
The 1/8-mile drag racing strip opened on September 29, 2001. In 2003, in cooperation with local law enforcement, Irwindale Speedway opened its own dragstrip and hosts legal drag races for street-legal cars, trucks, and motorcycles. The dragstrip is proud to extinguish the "nowhere else to go" excuse used by illegal street racers, and local police often hand out flyers to offenders for free entry into drag races at the dragstrip to promote safe racing.
The venue is also known for drifting events; when it hosted D1 Grand Prix's first overseas event in 2003, with a sell-out crowd attendance of 10,000, it had surpassed all other events Irwindale hosted in the past, the previous being 8,700. Since then, it has become the series regular opening round in February and a non championship event in December and has also hosted a round of the domestic series, Formula D. The venue has been expanded to accommodate 15,000 spectators. The circuit is regarded as one of the most popular courses for crowds and drivers despite the unforgiving concrete wall which drivers usually brush through with their rear bumpers. Because of its popularity, the circuit is nicknamed the House of Drift.
The 2003 Guinness Book of World Records lists the fastest-ever top speed of a radio-controlled car as 111 mph (178.63 km/h) set by Cliff Lett of Associated Electrics. Lett, a Team Associated professional driver and one of the designers and developers of the aforementioned RC10, set the record with a heavily modified Associated RC10L3 touring car at Irwindale Speedway on January 13, 2001.
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