Calder Park Thunderdome

Calder Park Raceway is a motor racing circuit in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The complex includes a dragstrip, a road circuit with several possible configurations, and the "Thunderdome", a high-speed banked oval equipped to race either clockwise (for right-hand-drive cars) or anti-clockwise (for left-hand-drive cars such as NASCAR).

As of 2025, the dragstrip and the road circuit remain in use for grassroots-level motorsport events, but the banked oval has not been used since 1999.

History

Calder Park Raceway was founded in the farming community of Diggers Rest and began as a dirt track carved into a paddock by a group of motoring enthusiasts who wanted somewhere to race their FJ Holdens. One of those men was Patrick Hawthorn, who at the time owned a petrol station in Clayton, when one of his clients suggested a place to race, on his property.

The inaugural meeting on a bitumen track was run by the Australian Motor Sports Club and took place on 14 January 1962. The track design was very similar to the existing Club Circuit, which is still in use today. Competitors at this meeting included former Calder Park owner Bob Jane (Autoland Jaguar 3.8 #84), Norm Beechey (Holden #40), John Wood (Holden #83) and Peter Manton (Mini Cooper).

In the early 1970s, champion racer and Melbourne tyre retailer Bob Jane purchased the track. The circuit not only hosted road racing but also drag racing while the infield formed part of the Rallycross track. The circuit was increased in length in 1986 to , though the short circuit still remains. As part of the changes to the circuit, the main straight was lengthened from to just under in length while the final turn (which was known for a long time as Gloweave Corner) was also moved forward approximately so that the road course and the start of the drag racing strip were separate (this was due to long time complaints from drivers and bike riders that the start of the main straight was notoriously slippery, especially in the wet, due to it also being the start of the drag strip). Lengthening the straight also gave the drag strip a longer runoff and slow down area. Jane also had the high banked NASCAR style Thunderdome built on the east side of the road circuit which opened in August 1987.

In 1982 the circuit was renamed to the Melbourne International Raceway,(Official program) National Panasonic Australian Grand Prix, Melbourne International Raceway, 6–7 November 1982 while for the round of the 1985 Australian Touring Car Championship, series broadcaster Channel 7 referred to Calder as the Keilor International Raceway.

Thunderdome

The Thunderdome is a purpose-built quad-oval speedway located on the grounds of Calder Park Raceway. It was originally known as the ''Goodyear Thunderdome'' to reflect the naming rights sponsorship bought by the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company.

With its "double dogleg" front stretch and the start/finish line located on a straight section rather than the apex of a curve, the Thunderdome is technically a quad-oval in shape, though since its opening it has generally been referred to as a tri-oval. The track, modelled on a scaled down version of the famous Charlotte Motor Speedway, has 24° banking on Turns 1, 2, 3 and 4 while the front stretch is banked at 4° and the back straight at 6°.

The Thunderdome was completed in 1987, but can trace its roots back over twenty years previously when Australian motorsport icon Bob Jane, previous owner of Calder Park Raceway, travelled to the United States and visited the Charlotte Motor Speedway and Daytona International Speedway numerous times to gauge stock car racing's rise in popularity. With NASCAR getting more air time on Australian television largely thanks to the influence of Channel 7 motorsport commentator and Sydney speedway promoter Mike Raymond, in 1981 Jane struck a deal with Bill France Jr., the head of NASCAR, to bring stock car racing to Australia and plans were laid out for a high banked oval adjacent to the existing Calder Park Raceway.

Ground first broke for the track in 1983 and it took four years to complete. It was built at a cost of A$54 million— with Jane personally contributing over $20 million of his own money. Due to the lack of such knowledge in Australia, during construction Jane was forced to bring in engineers from the US who had experience in building high banked speedway ovals. The Thunderdome was officially opened by the Mayor of the Keilor City Council on 3 August 1987.

The first race on the Thunderdome was held just two weeks after its opening, although the track used incorporated both the Thunderdome and the pre-existing National Circuit. It was a 300-kilometre event for Group A touring cars, with John Bowe and Terry Shiel in a turbocharged Nissan Skyline DR30 RS taking first place – to date the only time a Japanese car has won a race held on the Thunderdome.

AUSCAR had the distinction of hosting the first ever race to exclusively use the Thunderdome. The race, aptly named the AUSCAR 200, was held a week prior to the Goodyear NASCAR 500. In a shock to the male dominated establishment, 18-year-old female driver Terri Sawyer won the 110 lap race driving a Holden VK Commodore. Sawyer had qualified her Commodore on the front row of the grid and ran at or near the front all day to win from Kim Jane (the nephew of Calder owner Bob Jane), Max de Jersey, Phil Brock and Graham Smith. The top five positions all went to those driving either a VK or VL Commodore. Greg East, also driving a VK Commodore, sat on pole for the AUSCAR 200 with a time of 33.2 seconds for an average speed of .

The first NASCAR race that used only the oval was the Goodyear NASCAR 500 held on 28 February 1988 (unlike the "500s" in US NASCAR racing, the Australian version was only 500 km, or 310 mi - roughly the same distance as a Busch Series race). The race was nationally televised by the Seven Network and was shown in the USA on ESPN. It featured some of Australia's top touring car and speedway drivers as well as a slew of imports from the Winston Cup, including Bobby Allison (who had won his third Daytona 500 just two weeks earlier in a thrilling finish from his son Davey, giving the Thunderdome race a big publicity boost), Neil Bonnett (who had won the Winston Cup race at the Richmond International Raceway the previous weekend), Michael Waltrip, Harry Gant