Eldora Speedway

Eldora Speedway is a high-banked clay dirt oval. Located north of Rossburg, Ohio in the village of New Weston, Ohio, its website claims capacity for 22,886 spectators in the permanent grandstand, and unlimited admittance for the grass hillside spectator area. The permanent grandstand and VIP suite seats make it the largest sports stadium in the Dayton, Ohio-region according to the Dayton Business Journal.
Originally constructed as a semi-banked clay dirt oval by track founder and promoter Earl Baltes, Eldora was enlarged to a length and later to the "half-mile" standard required by the United States Auto Club for national championship events featuring the stars of the Indianapolis 500.
The track currently hosts events like the Kings Royal, the World 100, and Stewart's Superstar Racing Experience. From 2013 to 2019, Eldora hosted the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series' Eldora Dirt Derby. In 2013, the Dirt Late Model Dream and World 100 expanded from one-day shows to full three-day Thursday, Friday, and Saturday race weekend programs which have proven to be hugely popular. The Kings Royal followed suit in 2016.

History

Eldora Speedway New Weston, OH, was built in 1954 by Earl Baltes, a prominent area bandleader with no previous racing experience. Born on April 27, 1921, in nearby Versailles, Ohio, Baltes had stumbled onto a race at New Bremen Speedway and was so impressed by the big, enthusiastic crowd that he decided to build a race track.
Baltes had purchased the Eldora Ballroom from "Ma" Shoes two years earlier, offering weekly dances and musical performances. Eventually, Baltes curtailed the musical performances as the track grew more successful.
The track was constructed as a quarter-mile as it opened in 1954. Two years later, Baltes expanded the track to a three-eighths-mile, and in 1958 the track was expanded to the present half-mile length.
The track hosted the sprint cars of the United States Auto Club for the first time in 1962 and quickly became one of the favorite venues for the series.
In August 1965, Orville Yeadon won the first Eldora 500, featuring 33 sprint cars running 500 laps. One year later, Larry Cannon won the Eldora 500, and in 1967 Don Nordhorn won the Eldora 500, the last time the race was contested. Baltes was promoting several other tracks by this time, and the 500-lap race fell by the wayside.
In 1971 Baltes shocked the racing fraternity when he held the inaugural World 100, offering an unprecedented purse of $4,000 to the winner. Bruce Gould ultimately won the race. The event is widely considered the birth of the modern "dirt late model" type of racing, which today is one of the most popular forms of racing on America's short tracks.
When the World of Outlaws sprint car series was launched in 1978, Baltes recognized the promotional potential of the group and quickly booked several events at Eldora. It was a key partnership for the fledgling series, giving them much-needed credibility and momentum. In October, Eldora hosted the season finale where Steve Kinser captured the inaugural WoO championship and was proclaimed "King of the Outlaws." In the years that have followed, Eldora has remained a mainstay venue on the WoO circuit and annual King's Royal race.
While the pit wall bore "Home of the Sprint" for many years, Eldora started as a track for "jalopy" cars, then "new cars/stock cars", which eventually into the modern-day dirt late models. In 1971, Baltes posted a $4,000 winner's purse for the "World 100" which many racers and fans thought was a misprint in the advertising. Promising to raise the winner's share by $1,000 every year, the World 100 annually attracts the largest field of dirt late model racers globally. It is Eldora's largest attended event of the season. The 2017 event paid a record purse of $425,800 and attracted the largest crowd in the history of Eldora Speedway – while Eldora does not typically release attendance figures, the winner's share of the Tony Stewart Foundation 50/50 raffle on that Saturday night was over $38,000.
In the late 1970s, as the crossover between the stars of Indianapolis and USAC dwindled and the era's super-modified cars began to decline, Baltes took notice of a brash Texas promoter named Ted Johnson organizing a "band of outlaw" sprint car drivers racing for larger purses and, in most cases, with aerodynamic wings on their cars. Eldora's high-banks became Ohio and the midwest's home to the World of Outlaws, and, in 1984, Baltes pulled off another one of his firsts when he announced the '$50,000-to-win Kings Royal." In recent years, the event has grown into a three-day extravaganza offering over $385,000 in prize money and awards with regional satellite events in the week leading up to it.
Longtime USAC official, car owner, and sponsor, Johnny Vance of Aristocrat Products in Dayton, Ohio, approached Baltes in 1980 about trying an event in 1981 featuring all four of USAC's divisions in one show and called it the "4-Crown Nationals". At the time, USAC sanctioned the champ cars, national sprint cars, national sprint tour, and a stock car division similar to NASCAR's Grand National Division. The event was a success and celebrated its 37th running in 2018. It has seen several different iterations over the years. It has not run every year, having been wholly rained out/not rescheduled and replaced by the Mopar Million. When USAC dropped its stock car division, they were replaced by dirt late models, and as the World 100 grew, the late models were replaced by the UMP modifieds. As interest in the event waned, the World of Outlaws was added for a Friday show. USAC's remaining three divisions raced solely on Saturday.
The event is currently enjoying a renaissance with a weekend full of activity consisting of the World of Outlaws on Friday, USAC's three divisions plus the Tezos All Star Circuit of Champions sprint cars on Saturday, vintage car displays, and three days of racing for 300 USAC.25 midgets competitors and their families at Little Eldora. The 4-Crown Nationals has hosted two of short-track racing's most impressive performances: Jack Hewitt's sweep of the three USAC divisions and UMP modified feature in one night and Kyle Larson's sweep of the three USAC divisions.
In 2001 Baltes held the "Eldora Million", his defining achievement as a race promoter. Offering a $1 million prize to the winner, the race remains by far the richest short-track race in history. Donnie Moran captured the event and the top money, and was christened "the Million Dollar Man."
Three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Tony Stewart purchased the speedway in late 2004 from Baltes. Upon his retirement, the state of Ohio honored Baltes by renaming Hwy. 118 "Earl Baltes National Highway" from Ansonia to the south to St. Henry to the north.
In 2011, Stewart hired former Charlotte Motor Speedway vice president of events, Roger Slack, a protégé of the legendary promoter Humpy Wheeler, away from World Racing Group where he had served as executive vice president of the new event promotions department since 2009. Slack leads Eldora's day-to-day operations as general manager and speedway promoter. The historic racing oval has continued an aggressive capital improvement program with state-of-the-art luxury suites atop the turn three area. At the same time, fans also enjoy live coverage and replays of the on-track action via the large video board in turn two. Additional catch fencing, attenuators, a widened pit road, a dedicated helipad for Premier Health's CareFlight and Infield Care Center providing on-site facilities for Level 1 Trauma and ER staff are recent additions to benefit both fan and competitors in recent years.

Kings Royal

The Kings Royal is one of the biggest sprint car races in America. It paid $50,000 to the winner until the winner's share increased to $175,000 in 2019. The Kings Royal is typically run in July and sanctioned by the World of Outlaws Sprint Car series. The race draws a large field of cars each year and a capacity crowd of sprint car fans from around the globe.

The Historical Big One

Earl Baltes promoted the richest paying sprint car race in the country. The Historical Big One paid $100,000 to win, which was unprecedented for sprint car racing. The race was held from 1993 to 2003. The race returned in 2022 as part of the King's Royal week. The 2023 edition was rebranded the Eldora Million for its $1,002,023 winner's prize.
; Winners

1993 Jac Haudenschild
1994 Kenny Jacobs
1995 Steve Kinser
1996 Mark Kinser
1997 Dave Blaney
1998 Dale Blaney
1999 Kevin Gobrecht
2000 Steve Kinser
2001 P.J. Chesson
2002 Donny Schatz
2003 Daryn Pittman
2022 Brent Marks
2023 Logan Schuchart
Dirt Late Model Dream

The Dirt Late Model Dream is a 100-lap race that has been run annually every June since 1994. The World Racing Group currently sanctions it. The race is noted for its prize money, worth $100,000 for the winner.
The 2013 Ferris Commercial Mowers Dream featured a revised format which provided two full feature race programs on each of the preliminary nights 2013's $100,000 Dream winner Scott Bloomquist claimed victory in short track racing's richest event for a record-setting sixth time.
The 2001 rescheduled event featured the "Eldora Million", which paid an unprecedented $1,000,000 to winner Donnie Moran.
In 2020, the "Dirt Late Model Stream Invitational" was the race weekend's title as Dream week was held behind closed doors because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and only paid $50,000 to the winner because it was only available with an iPPV viewing package as there were no spectators. While Billy Moyer has ruled the World 100, Scott Bloomquist has ruled the Dirt Late Model Dream with eight $100,000 victories.
For 2022, the "Eldora Million" returned as a separate feature with a slightly increased prize of $1,002,022.
; Winners

1994 Freddy Smith, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
1995 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
1996 Donnie Moran, Dresden, Ohio
1997 Jimmy Mars, Elk Mound, Wisconsin
1998 Billy Moyer, Batesville, Arkansas
1999 Rick Eckert, York, Pennsylvania
2000 Freddy Smith, Knoxville, Tennessee
2001 Donnie Moran, Dresden, Ohio
2002 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2003 Darrell Lanigan, Union, Kentucky
2004 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2005 Matt Miller, Waterville, Ohio
2006 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2007 Steve Casebolt, Richmond, Indiana
2008 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2009 Jimmy Owens, Newport, Tennessee
2010 Billy Moyer, Batesville, Arkansas
2011 Don O'Neal, Martinsville, Indiana
2012 Shane Clanton, Fayetteville, Georgia
2013 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2014 Shane Clanton, Chickamauga, Georgia
2015 Jonathan Davenport, Blairsville, Georgia
2016 Dennis Erb, Jr., Carpentersville, Illinois
2017 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2018 Scott Bloomquist, Mooresburg, Tennessee
2019 Brandon Sheppard, New Berlin, Illinois
2020 Tim McCreadie, Watertown, New York
2021 Brandon Overton, Evans, Georgia
2022 Jonathan Davenport, Blairsville, Georgia
2022 Brandon Overton, Evans, Georgia
2023 Jonathan Davenport, Blairsville, Georgia
2024 Jonathan Davenport, Blairsville, Georgia
2025 Jonathan Davenport, Blairsville, Georgia