The JDL Castle Fast Track should bring some business to Winston-Salem and provide a little sports diversity for our community.
The track is a state-of-the-art indoor facility in West Point Business Park, intended for use by high-school and college track teams and Masters meets. It's only the second such track in the state and utilizes the same floor surface that's used in the Olympics. It's just off Stratford Road near several hotels, ideal for hosting out-of-town competitors.
Local builder and developer David Shannon acquired private financing for the project, which cost about $2.5 million and began construction in August. Craig Longhurst, a former All-American runner at Wake Forest University, is facilities manager for the track. He spoke to the Journal's John Dell about some of its off-track features: "When people have come out to see it, they have been amazed how much space there is for bleachers (enough for about 1,000 fans), meeting rooms and there's even a small snack bar. There's also plenty of room behind the bleachers for athletes to stretch out and rest before their events." There's also a shot-put pit and three small viewing rooms above the track.
Shannon and Longhurst have high hopes for their facility. They hope to host state track championships and even Big South and Southern Conference championships. Local colleges can rent it for practices.
By now the track, which opened last week, should be broken in. It was scheduled for a high-school meet on opening day, hosting about 1,000 athletes from 100 high schools, with meets planned for the next four weeks following and more scheduled after that.
Because of such venues as the new track, along with our baseball stadium and the Wake Forest Tennis Center, we may eventually need to redefine ourselves: The City of the Arts, Sports and Innovation.
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