[ronmil]

The Pontiac Silverdome has been in the news the last few days with it finally being successfully demolished. On this date (Dec. 6) 1980, I attended the first midget race ever run there. It was an invitational event called Heroes vs. Outlaws and paid a $50,000 purse. Steve and Kelly Kinser were among the participants. Gene Gennetten won the feature.

[Scott Daloisio]

Was an all star lineup, but what a fiasco. One session in the afternoon and the final at night. But, yellow flag after yellow flag pushed everything back. Did not finish till well after midnight. Promoter was a “know it allbconcert promoter. Had dust in my ears for months after that one

[Wizard 05]

I also ran that show as well as the LM show later when they tried it again..Rick Ferkel was part of the "Outlaw team" as well.. It was a great field of cars and stars,, just a very bad job of track prep and promotion..If the Chili Bowl is a 10,, Pontiac was a 3 at best. But at the time it was racing in the winter,,which was a good thing.

[GRAYBEARD]

The next year that dirt was still in a frozen pile in the parking lot. I think that was on purpose because of the cleanup from the year before.

[duel]

I went to all of the midgets races there. I think they had 90 midgets the 1st year. A two part show, afternoon quals and heats with evening features. Track was a disaster for features. No equipment for track it seemed. I think they used garden hoses to water it. whole place was dust big clean up for dome. What i heard was the next year they had a chemical in the dirt and the dirt froze outside. I think that was the year they actually had a super bowl there. They ran them on the floor and i think it was an asphalt type floor for 2 or 3 years.

[ossuks]

I was there! I am working with an old memory but it seems the cost to clean the facility was .19 per seat..80,000 x .19=$15,200 When you count for inflation that bill would be $38,000 today!! This was an additional cost added on because of the extreme amount of dust.

[chop]

I liked that 1st midget race. Roger Penske bought me dinner at that race. A local midget racer from Kalamazoo had a sponsor from a Big Boy restaurant. At the time the Silver dome had a Big Boy restaurant above one of the end zones. So we got a deal on a charter bus trip for that race and got to sit in the restaurant for the races. At some point during the afternoon show. We turn around and sitting at the other side of our large table was Rodger Penske with indy 500 winner Tom Sneva. Rodger looks around, call the waitress over and tells her to get food for every one at the table ( I think I can call him Rodger because we are dinner buds now. lol) Also between the afternoon races and the night time part all the drivers came up and got food. Not sure if Rodger paid for that or not. I did not think about it till on the way home, but I had this cool program with all the drivers pictures and information about them. Should have been a brave kid and gotten all of them to sign it. Guess I should just be happy to eat lunch with Rodger and Tom

[Stealth87]

Whichever year the dirt froze and they had to run pavement (81 or 82?). My parent's car won that race. They still talk today about how much money that was back then. I think it was around $3500 to win!

[sc17x]

Was there for the midget and Lt models shows , snuck into box seats meet Robert Smalley head of NDRA, drank beer with him and Johnnie Parsons .pretty cool evening

[jdull99]

Originally Posted by Stealth87 Whichever year the dirt froze and they had to run pavement (81 or 82?). My parent's car won that race. They still talk today about how much money that was back then. I think it was around $3500 to win!

Who was driving for them??? (Who are your parents?)