Old Fields
I came across this place by accident. I was lost on the way to Shenandoah Speedway, and because I was paying more attention to what song I wanted to listen to next, and less attention to the maps app on my phone, I made a few wrong turns. Over the guard rail and way below the highway I saw it, this expansive road course snaking it's way through West Virginia hills. Nearby were some shipping containers and what looked like cabins. There were no signs to advertise the location, so I just tried to memorize the road nearby - "Fish Pond." The following week when I got home I looked it up, a private training center used mostly by government agencies. It took me months to talk them into letting me bring some friends to drift their track, but the following spring there we were, Daxton, Mir and I ushering box turtles off the pavement and hoping the 15 or so drivers who had signed up would actually find this place and show up on time.
That first day was the wild west, with a little rain making the track slick, and the high speeds attainable even without a powerful car meant the stakes were high in some corners, where a miscalculation in line or grip could send a driver over the hillside into the trees. My expertise as an event host was also laughable, prior to this I had maybe 2 days of road course drifting experience, and my driver's meeting was basically a request that everyone keep their eyes up and try to be sensible. All of us were buzzing though, and with one event without incident in the books, some drivers were even talking about setting up cars specifically for this place.
Later that summer we brought even more drivers, too many for the impromptu afterparty at the local Mexican restaurant. When 40 drivers and their friends all showed up to eat in the same hour, in a town population of 2500, they didn't even have enough pitchers for water to handle the crowd. I even sent out little invitations via mail during the weeks leading up to the event, trying to convey just how special and rare this place was for us. Over time, as drivers including myself got more comfortable with the track, I saw some incredible moments: cars fully sideways at 80 miles per hour, four car tandems, impossible backward entries by a kid in a turbo Miata, while Daxton, Jordan and many other photographers braved the briars and ticks to capture it all. I even surprised myself with what I accomplished in my flyweight RX-7, the little 12a blaring full tilt over a blind crest before hucking it sideways into the hairpin, not much angle but lots of momentum.
Photo Credit: Daxton Scholl - Drift Pizza Media
As the place became better-known more organizers staged events there, and drivers from Michigan to Georgia got to experience a track that felt more like a closed-off mountain road with no police and no oncoming traffic. The excitement of the track created entire weekend social events. We had cookouts in the parking lot of rented townhouses nearby, or camped the night before on the skid pad near the track. One night I sat freezing in a one-person tent, listening to coyotes in the distance and hoping someone else would show up soon in the total darkness. Daxton was often heroic in these moments - he would show up early or even follow me down from Pittsburgh, he had a car that was actually comfortable to sit and wait in, and he brought numerous luxuries I could never think of, like food, water, and a phone charger.
Photo Credit: Daxton Scholl - Drift Pizza Media
In the back of my mind though, the place always felt finite, like one little misstep could shut the gates on us forever, especially since our events were pocket change compared to government contracts. Sure enough, the lawyers eventually descended upon our endeavors, as often happens to anything remotely exciting in this country. The track was no longer available unless organizers carried their own insurance, a tall ask for a track without a single barrier or fence. Though one organizer kept hosting events for another year or so, eventually it became unsustainable, and open track lapping was no longer a possiblity. Online, talk of driving there again would ebb and flow, and since I couldn't find an insurance company who would come within 1000 feet of what we wanted to do, I became more interested in returning as a driver rather than an organizer.
Hopefully the golden era of drifting in Old Fields is yet to come, and those summers I spent convincing friends who didn't even like cars to come and wave a caution flag won't be the last, and a train of S13s will sends echoes through the trees again. The future is uncertain, however, so I'm grateful for all the laps I got to turn at speed, all the drivers who gave me a chance to make a few events happen, and the friends from all over this side of the country that I made along the way, even the ones who like to manji the straights. - DFA
Photo Credit: Daxton Scholl - Drift Pizza Media
