Johnson and Wilkesboro: Former Winston Cup star Junior Johnson, who won 50 races behind the wheel and six championships as a car owner, said Friday he has been involved in some efforts to reopen North Wilkesboro (N.C.) Speedway, but doesn’t see any progress on the issue. Bruton Smith and Gary Bahre jointly bought the speedway in 1996, but each used one of the track’s two races dates for other tracks – Smith for Texas Motor Speedway and Bahre for his New Hampshire International Speedway. The North Wilkesboro track has not been open since. “I’ve put a little bit of effort into it,” he said. “Not enough to start shooting at somebody, believe me. I think the Wilkesboro race track should be opened. It has a lot of potential, maybe not for Winston Cup, but you’ve got a variety of things you could do. Johnson, who is grand marshal of Sunday’s Southern 500, said he has talked Bob Bahre, Gary’s father and co-owner, about selling, but he has never committed to a sale. “I think he’s to the point now where he doesn’t even want to talk about it,” Johnson said.(That’s Racin’) AND – North Wilkesboro Photo: Bob Hanner of The Stock Car Gallery stopped by North Wilkesboro Speedway after attending the Bristol race and took a nice shot of the track in it’s current state, see the image at: North Wilkesboro Speedway August 26th 2001(8-29/9-1-2001)
