Cedars Dragway located in Les Cedres, Quebec in the 60's early 70's

tom what are you doing with this info?

 

Hopefully before too many more months i'll finish and it will be published in some form. Not sure what form that'll take , book, website or CD maybe.

 

Yes I found it. It is now a landscape business but the two big cement square buttresses with the cable across used to keep us out when the track was not open are still there. Hard to recognize the place otherwise because of all the trees but they are unmistakeable.
I ran a 58 Dodge there and a 64 Plymouth. I was just a very young run for fun racer but even after I had moved up here I drove back many weekends to run. I was always treated well there with respect. I was very shy then and since I knew people there and was known it was more comfy for me running there then here at first even though a few years later I did Mopar tech in at Mohawk. I first raced at Cedres in July 66. When I started we were still on flags. I remember when the Christmas tree came we thought we had turned pro. One race really sticks out in my mind. It was the final Top Eliminator race of the day. They used to do that you know.
There was a 50s Hudson stocker racing a orange small block Chevy gas dragster. We were still running flag starts. The time offset was done back then by measured distance charts. The Hudson had 75 feet to go and the dragster the whole 1/4. The flagman stood on the finish line. The announcer made the most of it as well in both languages. I can still hear the big ol Hudson labouring for the finish line while the Chevy dragster was screaming its heart out. Believe it or not the Chevy dragster caught him and won signaled by the win flag girls who stood out from behind the finish line boards on whatever side won waving a big flag.
There is probably not two months go by I still don't think of that race some almost 50 years later. I was also there the day that same dragster puked its flywheel right at the line in early morning time trials. Luckily no life threatening injuries but it was pure luck.
don

 

Don, are these cement blocks the dark grey ones sitting either side of the narrow driveway at the south end of Cramer? 934 Chemin St Dominique on Google street view.

I am guessing if that was the entrance road you went in about 400 feet and turned left for 500 to 600 feet. That the track was behind the house a couple doors north at 960? The Google map shows a road there yet the picture shows there isn't even a path through the nursery there. Perhaps that road denotes the old track.

The Hudson vs dragster race sounds wild. I've found some old tracks with the staggered start markers and they usually only go out about 300 feet.
Probably a pretty hard concept for todays bracket racers to grasp!

 

Yes that is right. You could not drive straight in but went in between the posts and then jogged to get to the track and spectator fence. It ws as you know sort of hidden from view and on more then one occasion those big cement posts were the only way I could find it. If you came early and I always did before there was any traffic coming in it was easy to drive by if you were still half asleep.
RE Hudson vrs rail,I had never seen that big an offset before or since. I think they did it just to see if it could be done. I was astounded the rail caught him though. They did some neat stuff there for a small track. I remember Debs (Ralph Ridgeway) coming with the worlds first tunnel ram and match racing Bill Gaws CMP 55 chevy. I remember some of the mopar early funny cars which seem really funny now running with centre steering , no windows and early firesuits and goggle with 10% alky in the tank feeding carbed Max Wedge motors. Some of them were running in the ELEVENS!!!!!!!!! :>)Might have been John Petrie and friends but I am not sure. I also remember seeing The Quebec Express there once. Hopefully someone has a photo of that!
I still have my Time cards from there.
don

 

I was just searching for some old haunts when I came across this.
I'm not sure if you are still interested but I raced at Ceders in '78 and '79 which if I remember right that was the final year, the owner dug a ditch across the track in 1980 ruining it.
The club that ran it was "Funny Street Car Club" out of Vallyfield of which I was a short term member, president of the club was "Red" and he worked at the Goodyear plant there.
The Johnson brothers, Roddy and Derrick from Alexandria ran there as well as a fellow from Dalhousie QC that had a blue 68 or 69 Camaro that ran 9's or 10's, not enough strip there...side of his car was "Joe Pic" which was his nickname.
Beer was available for under a buck and ChomFM was blasting through the tower speakers. Only flagmen then, and trophies were handed out to winners every week. No name or dates or type of race was marked on them!
I never reattached my exhaust back to my headers and many others didn't either at the end of the day...noisy ride home!
I have lost a lot of photos of our times there but still have a photo of my Bee at the burnout line if you are interested.

 

I raced at Ceders during the sixties with Les Cloak and John Dingman to name a couple - had a 1962 Chev Biscayne
with a 409.

 

Picture of the owner of the dragway and Daniel Cadieux winner. His 1968 400 Firebird, still exist at Rigaud, but different owner.,