Photos: NASCAR’s Auto Club Speedway Demolition Continues – Front Gate, West Stands Gone

By Gary Gastelu |

Dec 8, 2023

auto club speedway gate — (Google Street View)

NASCAR is cleaning the slate.

Demolition of the former Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., continues as NASCAR awaits final approval to start building a new short track on the site.

The NASCAR-owned two-mile oval’s property is being redeveloped as a commercial park, with a small portion of it reserved for a half-mile oval.

The track hosted its final race this past February when Kyle Busch took the checkered flag.

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auto club 2 — (Hillwood Property Investments)Credit: NASCAR

The short track project has been postponed several times and NASCAR doesn’t have a definitive date for when it will be completed and host its first race.

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Officials have indicated that it could take 18 months to build once the work gets going, which puts the 2025 season in doubt.

Aerial view of the teardown work taking place today in turns 1-2 at California Speedway. Wonder if theyâ€™ll actually build the 1/2 mile short track. The front stretch area where itâ€™s supposed to go is still untouched by the demoâ€¦ ðŸ¤žðŸ¼#NASCAR pic.twitter.com/D32d93ba8F
— Mark J. Rebilas (@rebilasphoto) November 9, 2023

The surface of Turns 1 and 2 was torn up in November and captured by a drone photographer, but now more images of the demolition taken by local fans have started to surface on social media.

A sad sight to see if youâ€™re a nascar fan like me that lives in San Bernardino County ðŸ˜ pic.twitter.com/d4I9ceHIER
— Richard Petersen (@Richiee1991) December 8, 2023

One posted to X shows that the iconic mission-style front gate has been entirely removed.

West side of the grandstands pic.twitter.com/sHRBR7I0ql
— Steven Nava (@stevennava_) December 8, 2023

Another documents the destruction of the west end of the grandstands, which last had a capacity of 68,000, but were once big enough to hold 92,000 fans.

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Preliminary designs for the new track show it to have a paperclip design with sharp turns connected by long straights. The front straight is slightly curved along a smaller grandstand, something like a miniature version of the two-mile oval’s design.