South Bend Motor Speedway: built by its drivers

1946 — 2007, and after

Fourteen men and a quarter-mile: The speedway stands on State Road 2 — Western Avenue — west of Mayflower Road, about three miles west of the city: a high-banked quarter-mile paved oval. It was built over two years by the South Bend Auto Racing Association — Joe Kovatch and thirteen others, local drivers Charlie Van Acker and Charlie Szekendy among them — and it was built for midget racing. It opened on Friday night, 23 August 1946, before some 8,000 fans, with 25 cars on hand. Chicago's Ted Duncan, the fastest qualifier, won the 25-lap Class A feature, followed by Bob Muhlke, Frank Burany, and Gus Klingbiel. Klingbiel, a Wisconsin native, finished the season as the track's first champion.

The midget years: In the postwar years the track was a midget-racing hotbed, in SPEED SPORT's word. Tony Bettenhausen and Johnnie Parsons, the 1950 Indianapolis 500 winner, were frontrunners there; the early local favorites were Dick Good, Ebe Yoder, and Bob Newton, and Dick Good remained "the man" at South Bend for many years; the track was Denny Nyari's home ground. The United States Auto Club's National Midget championship raced there on its national calendar — documented on 18 July 1957 and 18 June 1958 in USAC's own season reviews, and again on 4 June 1966, when Jimmy Knight won the 50-lap feature and Mel Kenyon was fastest qualifier at 12.830 seconds. The track's longtime photographer, Jay Freet, told SPEED SPORT that two-time Indianapolis winner Gordon Johncock and other 500 winners raced at South Bend, and that South Bend's own Ryan Newman raced there.

Owners, closings, and returns: The promoter line runs through named hands. Louis Freeburn and Mike Bird are among the owners the record names; Bird, the owner in 1987, shut the track that year as attendance and car counts fell, then ran a single program in October 1988 to keep the speedway "grandfathered" under the rules of the day — a device its later keepers used again. The track closed for weekly racing in 2007. After three years idle, Jennifer and Scott Brown bought it — the South Bend Tribune recorded their purchase in April 2011 — and put money into sound, bleacher boards, the scoring tower, and concessions. Brothers Kevin and Vernon Sauer of Lakeville bought the speedway late in 2015, as Performance Racing Industry reported; Kevin Sauer later bought out his brother's share, and Kevin and Brandy Sauer came to own South Bend and Plymouth Speedway both. The forms widened with the years: stock cars joined and then succeeded the midgets, and on 11 June 2011 the Midwest Supermodified Association brought supermodifieds back to the track for the first time in 25 years — Lou Cicconi Jr. won the 40-lap feature and set the all-time supermodified track record, 10.086 seconds, before a crowd of about 1,100.

Sources:

1. Stan Kalwasinski, "The Last Lap," SPEED SPORT, 27 May 2024 — the builders and the two-year construction, the 23 August 1946 opening before some 8,000 with 25 cars, Duncan's first feature win and the men behind him, Klingbiel the first champion, the midget hotbed and its frontrunners, the owners Freeburn and Bird, the 1987 closing and the October 1988 grandfathering program, the 2007 end of weekly racing, and Jay Freet's account of the 500 winners and of Newman at the track.
2. USAC, National Midget season reviews (1957, 1958, and 1966, the 1966 review by Richie Murray) — the USAC National Midget races at South Bend Motor Speedway of 18 July 1957, 18 June 1958, and 4 June 1966, with Knight's win and Kenyon's 12.830 fast time in 1966.
3. South Bend Tribune, April 2011 — the Brown family's purchase after three idle years and their upgrades.
4. Performance Racing Industry, 8 December 2015 — the Sauer brothers' purchase of the speedway.
5. TJSlideways, 11 June 2011 — the MSA supermodifieds' return after 25 years, Cicconi's feature win and 10.086-second track record, and the crowd of about 1,100.