Cedar Lake Speedway: Home of ‘old-fashioned fun’

Rachel Kroeger

Staff

July 21, 2025

NEW RICHMOND – Whether a professional driver working a national touring series; a local wrench-turning, car lover entering a first race; or a general speed enthusiast looking for a show – Bob Kaufman, co-owner of the Cedar Lake Speedway, said there’s something for everyone at the New Richmond racetrack.

“People are less interested in racing, in general, than they were probably 30 years ago,” he said. “So, we like to say that we’re not in the racing industry – we’re in the entertainment industry. There just happens to be a race going on.”

Hosting races where both local drivers and professionals are welcome to show off their chops behind the wheel, Kaufman said there’s plenty of action for the surrounding community and traveling tourists to enjoy on the track.

“I will talk to somebody who doesn’t know anything about racing [or] has never been to a race in their life – they come out and 99% of the time, they just have [had] a great time, because it’s entertaining,” he said. “We’re a 0.375-mile, high-bank dirt track where [drivers are] sliding around the corners, bumping into each other, and there are lots of wrecks and excitement. It’s a very different entertainment event than what you think of when you watch NASCAR on TV.”

And the race, Kaufman said, is only part of the fun to be had at Cedar Lake Speedway.

“We do pre-race activities and after-race parties either with a band or DJ,” he said. “There’s [also] a [nearby] river you can go floating down.”

With stands with a seating capacity of roughly 8,000 fans, surrounding green space with room for an additional 2,000 spectators and a neighboring campsite with hundreds of drive-up lots available for rent on their property – located at 2275 County Road CC in rural New Richmond – Kaufman said travelers and fans can make a weekend getaway out of a race if they’d like.

“We make it a whole weekend [event] for people, and they come from all over the country to spend their time and weekend at the track,” he said.

An impressive track record

Founded in 1957, Kaufman said the Cook family – specifically Elmer Cook and his two sons, Gary and Bob – decided to build their community a racetrack.

“The Cook family owned some land and an excavating company,” he said. “One day, they [decided] it’d be a good spot to build a racetrack, so they did, and held their first race back in 1957.”

According to Cedar Lake Speedway’s website (cedarlakespeedway.com), 12 cars raced for 85 spectators during “the opening show on [the] flat, clay oval.”

Over the years, per the website, the Cook family continued to expand and improve the raceway and the grounds until 2001, when Kaufman said he and his brothers, Steve and Chuck, along with their business partner, Brad Both, bought the track.

“I’m the youngest of nine children, and one of my brothers is sort of a true entrepreneur in the family,” he said. “Steve started his first business at 18 years old and has never worked for anybody since. When I was in my upper 20s, he came to me with this idea to buy this racetrack. I said to him, ‘Steve, are you crazy? We don’t know anything about racing.’ And he said, ‘No, trust me, this is a really good business. Just come at least look at it with me.’”

With a master’s degree in finance, Kaufman said he thought Steve valued his “business sense” and brought him along to view the property.

“So, I went and met with the former owners – these two brothers – and I fell in love with the business model,” he said. “What I found out relatively quickly [is] the people [who are] into this sport, both from a competitor’s perspective and a fan perspective, [are] very loyal… I realized, ‘Okay, even I can’t screw this up.’”

Putting together the original group of himself, his two older brothers and Both, Kaufman said they purchased Cedar Lake Speedway from the Cook family – who, he added, stayed on to help them acclimate to the business.

“The family members were willing to stay on and show us the ropes since we had not been in the racing community, historically,” he said. “Bob and Gary Cook, who we bought it from, and their wives worked with us for the first couple years. Bob Cook has since passed, but his wife, Marge Cook, still works for us today. So, 25 years in[to our ownership], and she’s still very involved in the business.”

Though Steve “has since left” the racetrack, Kaufman said the group took on another partner – Chris Heinbuch – and hired additional staff to keep the business operational and, above all, fun.

“We’ve always had two or three full-time people throughout the business, and then a whole bunch of part-timers,” he said. “On a given weekend, we might have 50-60 part-time employees [working].”

Facilities upgrades, investments, additions

Cedar Lake Speedway’s races themselves, Kaufman said, have also changed significantly since drivers’ first jaunt on the track in 1957.

“We have two large jumbotrons – electronic LED billboards – right where we can do things like a Fan Cam and instant replay,” he said. “[For] the race itself, we try to do things to make it entertaining. Back in the day, races used to take five or six hours, [but] our goal is now [to always finish it at] around three hours, because peoples’ attention spans [are] not that long.”

In addition, Kaufman said he and his partners have worked to make race viewing a more comfortable experience for their patrons.

“We’ve certainly made improvements to the seating,” he said. “There are back rests, so when you’re sitting there for three hours, you’re more comfortable, [and] we’ve added VIP suites [because they’re] a popular thing for businesses to [rent to] be able to bring clients and employees [to races].”

By expanding their campsite to more than 1,300 lots, Kaufman said Cedar Lake Speedway is able to welcome additional longer-term visitors now more than ever – something, he added, they are taking advantage of.

“We have a couple [of yearly] events where people come and camp for the weekend, so they make a summer holiday out of it…,” he said. “We have an event coming up here in August where all the [1,300 lots are] already sold out.”

Another popular event Kaufman said he and his team introduced is Cedar Lake Speedway’s annual bus race.

“We started it, I think, probably 18 years ago, and it wasn’t our creative idea, because other tracks do bus races,” he said. “What’s unique to us, and what we did differently, [was] when other tracks race buses, they have professional race car drivers race the buses, but we tried something new, and we’ve been doing it ever since.”

That “something new,” Kaufman said, required the skills, talents and bravery of local high schools.

“We buy 10 school buses every year – [even though] the prices have been going up and up and up – but nonetheless, we invest in these buses, and we bring them to the local area high schools,” he said. “We invite the schools to participate in this event. We donate the bus to the school, and they use it as part of their curriculum. So, the shop class or the tech-ed department students have to turn the bus into a race bus – take out the glass, take out the seats, weld in a roll-cage to keep the driver safe, soup up the engine – [and] the art department paints it the school colors.”

The kicker – or, in this case, accelerator – Kaufman said, is that the buses are then raced by the schools’ faculty and staff.

“Our rule is that a faculty member from the school needs to drive the bus, so we’ve had everyone from the principal to the lunch lady to the biology teacher [race a bus], and all the kids come out to cheer on their school,” he said. “[Schools] might have two football teams competing on the field, but we have 10 high schools competing against each other in a bus race.”

Kaufman said the event is Cedar Lake Speedway’s “most popular event” every year.

“We have more people every year that attend that bus race than any other event,” he said. “So, we’re quite proud of it, because in today’s day and age, [we like to have what I] call a little bit of old-fashioned fun.”

And the fun doesn’t end at the track, or after summer, as Kaufman said Cedar Lake Speedway also features an indoor motocross and go-kart track.

“For the first dozen-or-so years, it was [a] summer-only [business], and we’d sort of lock the doors and shut the place down in the winter,” he said.

The indoor racing facility was a project brought to Cedar Lake Speedway by another pair of business partners in 2008 who Kaufman said purchased 20 acres of the land and “put up a multi-million-dollar indoor facility the size of a super Walmart” before, unfortunately, succumbing to the 2009 recession.

“It’s 120,000 square feet, and just as they opened is about the time the economy tanked,” he said. “So, to make a long story short, they ended up getting foreclosed on, and we purchased the business – because it’s literally on our property – from the bank. We’ve been operating that ever since.”

Community value, service

Though not all in the area share his and his customer’s love for racing, Kaufman said the value it brings to the New Richmond community and beyond is undeniable.

Growing up just across the Mississippi River in Roseville, Minnesota, Kaufman said though he and his brothers are not West Central Wisconsin natives, they’ve witnessed the effects of Cedar Lake Speedway.

“From where our family grew up… the racetrack is maybe 30 minutes away, so not too far,” he said. “I [also] raised my family in a town called Lake Elmo, [Minnesota], which is only about 20 minutes from the track. So, we’ve been fairly close for some time.”

With the popular sport being one of the noisiest, Kaufman said he can’t blame those who dislike racing, but urges them to recognize the racetracks’ value to the community.

“There’s always a small percentage of people that don’t like racing because it’s noisy, and every so often you’ll get a neighbor complaining,” he said. “[But] what’s rewarding for me is there are so many people who recognize how good it is for the community. This event [we’re holding] in August – with 1,300 campsites sold and people coming from all over the country, the hotels are completely booked in town. I don’t know what the population of New Richmond grows to that weekend, but it’s significantly more, and it’s great for the community.”

So, for those who may have written racing off, Kaufman said he encourages them to check out a nearby track.

“Go check out a local dirt track, because it’s fun, and I think you’ll enjoy it,” he said. “We’re proud to be a part of that, and happy that the community continues to support us – because we’ve seen that on multiple occasions over the years, the community is supportive of us because they know we’re good for the community.”

For more on Cedar Lake Speedway, its race schedule and divisions, visit its website or find it on social media.