Six months ago, Pagoda MX Raceway was just a field of weeds. This past weekend, more than 80 Slingshot racers — from as far as North Dakota, Quebec, and Florida — ventured to the track’s grand opening. The 1/5-mile Birdsboro, Pennsylvania, dirt oval hosted the World Slingshot Championship.
“We worked right up to the last day before the Nationals,” said Rich Tobias, who helped Pagoda Motorcycle Club president Dustin Morris bring the new track to fruition. “I brought the grader over from [Action Track USA in] Kutztown and began grading two weeks ago. Dustin did most of the work — he had an on-site crew of about 100 employees working on the infrastructure.”
Tobias’ connection to the motorcycle club goes deeper than some might think.
“Most people didn’t know that this project started 16 or more years ago,” Tobias said. “I met with the Pagoda Motorcycle Club before I built Action Track USA. We talked over the years about building an oval on their property.”
Pagoda MX Raceway will be used primarily as a flat track motorcycle venue, despite Slingshots helping debut the new facility.
“We had an exhibition race of five motorcycles,” said Tobias. “The drivers liked the scenario of having a cushion on the track [which was built for the Slingshots].”
The track has two 700-seat grandstands. The World Slingshot Championship attracted spectators from both Slingshots and motorcycles.
“Some bike people had never seen cars on a flat track, and some car people had never seen bikes racing on dirt flat track,” Tobias said. “The opportunity for cross-promoting the two types of racing is intriguing.”
Tobias said he does not anticipate Slingshots racing at Pagoda MX Raceway regularly, but the door is open for those who want to run there on occasion.
“It will be a testing facility for the Slingshots — a place to practice,” said Tobias. “But, you will have to be a Pagoda Motorcycle Club member to practice there. This is a new and interesting concept.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
