Tiny cars have huge impact on Johnsonville

The power and speed of the go-karts may be belied by their size, but the economic impact of the races could not be more important to the city of Johnsonville.

The second annual Tri-State All-Star Series races took place at Wheel Crazy Kartway in Johsonville Feb. 18-19 with thousands of people in attendance. With the attendees, support crews and racers, there was also a large amount of tourist dollars that were brought into the area.

Michael Stone, the owner of Wheel Crzay Kartway, said that the races have an enormous economic impact on the city.

“I know we had about 1,500 people come in for the race,” he said. “The races have a tremendous economic impact.”

“The Coachman Inn in Hemingway filled up. The restaurants like Shady Rest had to bring on extra staff to deal with the amounts of people that came through.”

Stone cited a racing statistic that says each race entry brings with it $400 spent. There were 523 entries this year.

“Now, that is not all spent locally, but a large portion of that money does go to the local businesses,” he said.

Race enthusiast and announcer for the Johnsonville races, Phil Combs said that the impact of the races can be measured simply by looking at the number of RVs and cars present in Wheel Crazy Kartway’s parking lot.

“We had folks come all the way from Maine and Florida, and when you get that big of a group of people coming into any town, it’s like a small version of what a NASCAR race is,” Combs said. “Your motels fill up and your restaurants are filled up”

“It’s a huge impact on the local economy.”

Combs said that he had heard of some people that had to venture to Florence and Conway to find a place to stay.

“It’s big time, because there’s a lot of folks that will spend a lot of money while they are in town,” he said. “I feel like it was a huge success, with all of the people that we brought in from all over the county.”

While Combs said the races attendance was great, he felt that the people of Johnsonville were unaware of the importance of the races.

“I think it is one of the best-kept secrets in Johnsonville,” he said. “I think there were a lot of people that didn’t have a clue that anything that big was going on there.”

Combs said that he thought the city of Johnsonville should embrace the races and create events around it.

“I think the town of Johnsonville, if they were to entertain the same things as Daytona or Charlotte, and create a sort of race festival that got the local folks involved in it, I think it would only make the event better,” he said.

While the economic impact of the race is immensely important to the cities of Johnsonville and Hemingway, the fact that the series is one of the most important in racing is important is not lost on Stone and Combs.

“A few years ago, we had (2011 Daytona 500 winner) Trevor Bayne at the track in Johnsonville,” he said. “I pulled out my driver profile sheet on him from 2004.”

“You very well may have the next Trevor Bayne at your track in Johnsonville and not even realize it.”

Michael Stone said that while the general perception of go-kart racing may not be accurate, the people that matter understand what the sport is all about.

“Karting is the stepping-stone to your higher class series, like the Sprint and Nationwide series,” Stone said. “We have kids that were racing at the track that had already signed letters of intent to run with NASCAR teams at age 14.”

“The race we had, it’s like the Daytona 500 of kart racing.”