Racers share passion
Autumn Colours Classic returns to Peterborough Speedway
Kelly Balson has been to all 25 Autumn Colours Classics and he’ll be coming to many more.
The Hampton, Ont., native, who has called Peterborough Speedway his home track since 1992, says the three-day stock car festival has become so much more than racing. It helps that his wife Amanda Balson, former Amanda Connolly, shares the same passion. He races in the Super Late Model and she in the Late Model divisions. They first met at Peterborough Speedway and married 15 years later.
Kelly Balson, 49, is one of the few outside of track owner J.P. Josiasse, to attend every Classic. He was 24 and in his second year of racing, he had just moved up to the Challenger division in 1993, when then track owner Kim Wallace created the Classic. It was originally a two-day event and from day one fell on Thanksgiving Weekend.
“It was popular right off the bat because there weren’t a lot of end of the year specials in 1993,” Balson said. “Now there is the Velocity 250 at Sunset Speedway a couple of weeks ago and the Frost Fest at Flamboro last weekend. The Classic always wraps up the racing year but it has spawned those other end of the year races.”
The buzz spread through word of mouth in those early days.
“There was no internet back then,” Balson said. “There were a lot of phone calls going back and forth...I knew at the time Kim was onto something and time has proven that.”
While races run Friday through Sunday, unless rain pushes them to Monday, drivers begin arriving on Wednesday and Thursday.
“People book their holidays around this,” said Balson. “Some people go to Florida. Some people go to Vegas. Racers go to the Classic.
“We were there Wednesday morning. You’re getting your hauler in line and getting a good pit spot, you’re setting up your camping spot. (Wednesday night) there were probably 500 people there camping. That doesn’t happen at the other tracks.”
In the early days, he says it was a race to get there early on the Saturday to get a good pit spot.
“We decided, some friends and I, to show up on Friday night with our campers,” said Balson. “Then it turned into, we had better get there Thursday.”
That went on until drivers started arriving Tuesday and the desire to get a good pit and camping spot even led to conflict, said Balson. He says that changed when Josiasse, who bought the track in 1999, started charging for reserved camping spots. The 210 spots are sold out every year.
“It’s no longer a free for all,” Balson said. “No one wants to pay money but in this instance I’m happy with it because no one needs to get there Monday to get a good camping site. You pay for your camping site a year in advance.”
The weekend is a family affair for many who hold their Thanksgiving dinners during the weekend. Racing has been a family sport for the Balsons well before they first met. Amanda, 37, started coming in 1998. Kelly drives for the TTC and Amanda works for the Toronto police services.
“Both Kelly and I grew up around the sport,” Amanda said. “Kelly more in drag racing and truck pulling and my father in stock car racing. When you share the same interest and both love to do the same thing every weekend it certainly helps keep everyone together.”
Amanda says their relationship is unique in that they are both drivers but she says women have become a fixture in stock car racing compared to when she entered the sport 18 years ago.
“There are certainly tons of women in the pits doing everything from changing tires to taking lap times and being spotters on the radio for their husbands. I’ve seen over the last decade a huge spike in women’s interest in general around the speedway,” she said.
What is unique about the Classic, Amanda said, is it brings together people from tracks all across Ontario.
“It just seems to me that when you come to the Classic it’s new friends, it’s old friends, in some cases people I haven’t seen in a decade,” she said. “It’s the racing community. It’s like a little town all in one spot for four or five days. The racing is great. The party is great. The food is great. It’s a really good time with one giant group of people who share the same love for the same sport.”