ARCA Menards Series Returning to Mid-Ohio after 55-year absence.
Toledo, Oh. (May 14th, 2021) – Stock car and road racing fans in the Midwest will have a convergence of sorts when the ARCA Menards Series returns to Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course for the first time since 1965.
Cincinnati-based brand Dawn Dish, America’s #1 dish liquid, will be the entitlement sponsor of the Dawn 150, scheduled for Friday evening, June 4, on the 2.258-mile, 13-turn road course in Lexington, Ohio.
“We’re proud to join fans at the track and families at home for the Dawn 150 this year,” said Kristine Decker, Vice President of North America Dish Care at Procter & Gamble. “Our team at Dawn has spent decades making it faster and easier to get the dishes done, so you can spend less time at the sink, and more time enjoying American traditions like race day.”
The Dawn 150 will be the first ARCA Menards Series race at Mid-Ohio in 55 years, 10 months, and 11 days – or 20,404 days – breaking the record for longest interval between races at a single track in series history. The previous record was broken in 2020 when the series returned to Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee for the first time since 1969, a gap of 51 years and 4 months, which translates to 18,751 days.
“We are ecstatic to be back in central Ohio for the first time in many seasons,” said ARCA president Ron Drager. “We raced at the now-closed Mansfield Motorsports Park a couple of times about a decade ago, and we’ve had a lot of great conversations with the team at Mid-Ohio in recent years. Ohio is a great state for motorsports, and we have a lot of great fans in the central part of the state. We were all set to return last year before the pandemic put the brakes on our plans. It’s been a long time since our last visit there and we’re ready to go back and write another chapter in the history books to go with Jack Bowsher’s win there in 1965.”
Series Title Sponsor Menards is also excited to have ARCA racing at Mid-Ohio.
“Central Ohio is a huge market for Menards and all of the vendor partners that support the ARCA Menards Series,” said Jeff Abbott, promotions manager for Menards. “Stock cars have been putting on a great show there for the last several seasons and we’re looking forward to a full weekend of action now with the ARCA Menards Series on Friday and the NASCAR Xfinity Series on Saturday. We encourage all of the fans in and around central Ohio to stop by their local Menards stores and “Save Big Money” on discounted tickets to both races.”
The legendary Jack Bowsher won in the ARCA Menards Series’ only previous visit to the winding 2.4-mile road course located Lexington, about an hour north of Columbus and about two hours south and east of ARCA’s home offices just north of Toledo. That race was a 250-mile affair that took over three hours to complete, with Bowsher eclipsing Les Snow, Jack Shanklin, Elmer Davis, and Benny Parsons at the finish.
“We are thrilled to have the legendary ARCA Menards Series return to Mid-Ohio during our 60th season of racing in 2021 with the support of a great Ohio brand like Dawn,” said Craig Rust, president of Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. “The Dawn 150 is going to provide some thrilling racing action featuring the future stars of NASCAR for our fans on Friday late afternoon, then we have the B&L Transport 170 NASCAR Xfinity Series race on Saturday to wrap up an exceptional weekend of racing.”
The Dawn 150 will be televised live on FS1 and broadcast live on MRN Radio. The ARCA Menards Series Dawn 150 will serve as a prelude to the NASCAR Xfinity Series race on Saturday, June 5. For updated event information, please visit ARCARacing.com and midohio.com.
