How it all began

Originally published in Moto Sports magazine issue 163 March 2005.

New Hampshire’s Route 10 winds along up and down the countryside, two-lane blacktop passing through towns and colonial era villages eventually opening to reveal Winchester Speedpark. But the road to bring David and Suzanne Boisvert’s dream of opening their own track to life was filled with as many obstacles as their Dirtwurx built Supercross track.
Suzanne describes herself and Dave as “high-school sweethearts” and although David didn’t grow up racing (his parents weren’t too keen on it) by the time they met his love for the sport was already well established. Racing from 1986 on with District 34, NESC and NEMA as well as putting in some national qualifying efforts gave them a solid sense of the fun, excitement and family that Motocross provided. As with many racers David dreamed of someday owning his own track and in 1998 he and Suzanne began the odyssey that would eventually lead them to Winchester.
Living in Townsend Mass at the time they found a piece of land that they thought would be the place to bring their dream of a motocross track to life. They met with lawyers and engineers, drew up plans and began the process of getting it approved by the town. Suzanne and David went to town meetings, made up T-shirts, signs, brought in some friends from NEMA and the AMA to help and really campaigned even speaking to the local TV cameras. Because the original plan called for an MX track and skateboard park it was very controversial and after a year of putting heart, soul and thousands of dollars of savings into it they were shot down. After spending time recovering from that they decided to try again and so they started looking at pieces of land all over Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Then fate finally began to lend a hand.

So how did you end up getting the Winchester track open?
Suzanne: Well the good news about all of those unsuccessful efforts that we had made, being in the papers and being so vocal and really trying hard was recognized by the people that owned Winchester Speedpark. At the time they were an oval Sprint car track and they were having a little trouble with his business so they called us and asked us about coming in as partners. We went up and looked the track over and thought they were very nice but we weren’t really looking to have partners. Instead we decided to spend some time building a new house and just taking care of some other things. In January of 2002 we get this call from them again and they were on the brink of losing the whole place, they needed someone to come in.
David: They had like a month before the town was just going to come in and take it all.
Suzanne: So it was like April 2002 that we closed papers and then it was just a whirlwind to get the place open. (to David) I don’t know how you did it.
David: That was probably the hardest I ever worked in my life there was so much junk on the property it was unbelievable. There were at least 25 junk cars, animals everywhere, 2 mobile trailers and trees all over, just trash everywhere.
Suzanne: There was an abandoned horse barn with this much manure in it. (indicating her hip) So there we are working to clean the place up and build up the name again and meanwhile we don’t have any software, computers, really anything and we don’t know how we are going to run the sign ups, there was just so much. Luckily we had so many friends in the racing community that came in and helped us out.
David: It was a scary thing but at least we had friends and people in the sport that we could go to. I mean as far as the racing aspect I wasn’t worried but the business aspect you forget about so much. I mean my dream was always to be up on the dozer grooming the track, to me that was owning a track and there is just so much more.
Suzanne: The best part about this was that when we went to the town of Winchester told them we had bought the track and that we were planning on doing motocross racing they just stood up and clapped. It was like night and day compared to all of the town boards that we had been in front of. The town of Winchester has been amazingly supportive we are so pleased to be there.


The SX track was the first open, why did you go with that format?
David: Basically we were just making the best use of the space that we had at the time.

How was it that you came to get involved with Dirtwurx?
Suzanne: Well Dave was like “we should try Dirtwurx” and I was thinking what are you kidding me.
David: In my mind I just figured that we would try the best and if they said no then we would work out something else. So I called Rich and it took him 2 or 3 weeks to get back to us but when they called us and Rich says “This is Dirtwurx”.
Suzanne: I remember answering the phone and we were just “Oh my god, he‘s really on the phone” and Rich is the nicest, most down to earth person you’ll ever meet. So we told him what we wanted to do, sent him some dimensions and we set this date that he would be coming in March to Winchester.
David: Luckily that year we had a good winter so he told us what he needed for equipment and that he needed at least 100 loads of dirt and it’s got to be this particular type of dirt, I mean you think dirt is dirt.

Was building the MX track something that you had planned from the start?
Suzanne: No, how that happened was just a miracle.
David: When we were building the Supercross track we had a bunch of people bringing us dirt to check out, all these 5 gallon buckets of dirt and the last guy to come in is Gary Beaman, and he is this 300 pound bear of a guy. He comes in and he is like come on with me, so we get in his truck and go down his gravel pit and shows me this dirt which is great and asks me “do you like it?” So I tell him that we need 100 truckloads in like a week and he tells me I’ll have every single truckload for you by Friday” and sure enough he had 100 loads piled up at the end of the pits by Friday.
Suzanne: So we establish this great relationship with him, he just had so much respect for the amount of work that David was doing and it turns out that he owns the land across the street.
David: We had asked him a couple years ago, just sort of dreaming about things if he was ever interested in selling the land and he had other plans for it so that was that. Then last year we asked him again and he agreed to sell, I mean right across the street how perfect can you get.

When you started building the MX track did you consciously design it to be “old school?
David: I had the idea to build a motocross track and so I called Rich from Dirtwurx and asked him to come out and walk a track with me. So he came out with his four-wheeler, we laid it all out and we both had the same thing in mind, to build a real motocross track. I mean we could have done a wicked Motocross/Supercross style track over there but we wanted to keep it a more natural terrain. I guess some people disagree with that and think it could be more exciting but I’ll tell you every single day that we have a race and the ambulance company tells us they haven’t had to leave all day I’m happy.
Suzanne: That’s the most important thing.
David: I check out the track all day long and I look to see the different lines and how people are passing so if I see a spot where I only see one or two lines I start to try and think of little changes I can make. Bottom line is the rider has got to be creative and use their head that’s what motocross is.

Take us through a typical week getting ready for a race.
David: Usually on Sunday when the race finishes, or even before if I can, I jump on the backhoe and start doing trash. Then I’ll go there on Monday finish up the trash, survey the damage and see what needs to be done. Tuesdays we will cleanup, sweep out the insides of the track and do the food order, sometimes take a half-day off. Then on Wednesday and Thursday we start grooming the tracks and on Friday start watering.
Suzanne: Luckily my mother does the concession stand and hopefully she’ll be back to do that in 2005. We have a good crew of flaggers and we try to support the teenagers in town. I just have a great crew of people that show up and do what they are supposed to do and we try to make it fun and pay them well.
David: A big thing for us last year was getting Tom Lyons as our Head Referee and then families like the Stacy’s who have helped us so much.


What is the hardest track position to fill?
David: I think there all hard jobs. I mean you have to have good referees someone who is fair, with the right attitude that loves racing. Flaggers need to be good, the starters have to know what is going on, the finish flaggers keep things running on the track and the scorers have to be accurate. I mean you lose one and you lose the link….it’s a whole team, you take one piece out of that and it can screw the whole thing up

What do you feel you offer racers at WSP that separates you from other tracks?
Suzanne: I think it is our professionalism and our attitude, plus we really try to gear towards families.
David: I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I’m a racer so I have kind of seen all the aspects of it and then I just put it my way. Then when people come up to me and say “hey what about this?”…I know how they feel. It’s not like I just want your money and don’t care, I want everything to go right. We listen and we try to treat everyone equal.
Suzanne: We want to strive to always be better, we want it to be a nice facility. Because we went with David as a family when he was racing and it gets tough being out in the middle of nowhere in the dirt. I think it’s appealing to me as a woman that we have real toilets. (laughs) Plus there are so many siblings that come who don’t race, we want it to be a place for everyone.
David: We want it to be like your weekend vacation.

Do you think that the special event stuff that you do is a boost for turnout or just a bonus you like to offer the racers that are coming anyway?
Suzanne: To be honest with you we could care less if we gain one more person, we just want to do it better for the riders/families and make sure they all have more fun.

How do you balance the safety and challenge aspects of planning a track?
Suzanne: Honestly that is why we hired Dirtwurx, that is why we spent the money to get a professional. I don’t think it’s safe or wise to just decide your going to build a track. I mean it has to do with so many factors, where are you going to land off a jump and how that works into the next section.
David: You ask Rich from Dirtwurx any question with regard to that and he has got an answer. People are always saying to me “You know how to do the track why don’t you just do it?”
Suzanne: What if someone got hurt because of something we tried to do to save money? It’s just not worth it.

Do you feel a sense of responsibility to the racers?
Suzanne: Oh yes, they’re like our families I feel close to everybody that we have come to know. I mean they are our customers so you want to make them happy but it is more than that. We know how expensive it is because we have done it, I mean all the time that you take to get the bikes ready, all the practice time that is invested and all the traveling. It’s a huge investment of time and money so we want to give them what they want.
David: We try to always give them our best.

Lets talk about some of the stuff you have coming up for 2005.
David: We have some really exciting things coming up for 2005, a couple of the things we are planning start before you even get to the track. We understand that not everyone in the family comes out to the track to race so we want to offer something for all of them as well. We are planning on putting in a volleyball court, clearing off some land along the river as a beach area for swimming or fishing.
Suzanne: And a bathhouse….with showers.

The Grand Prix format race is something that seems to very well received can you tell us a little about that?
Suzanne: We are looking at it as a way to change things up and we will see what the reaction is.
David: We look at people that will be racing our tracks week in and week out and try to give them something different, it should be a fun event. It will be a different kind of start; I can maybe add a loop in the field or something to make it a little interesting. Some people might love it, some might not so you have to just wait and see if that is something people want.


The New England Regional series September 3rd, 4th and 5th looks to be fun. What format will be used for that weekend?
Suzanne: That will be a three-moto format kind of like the Mini-O’s. The first day will be more practice and qualifiers.
David: Everything will be on a time schedule, first day all the classes will have a long practice and then after that we start the qualifiers. We are only running the primary bike classes for this, no open class and the idea is that the winner of each class is the best in New England.

How would you like to see this series grow?
David: I would like to see this be an annual event and have it be the biggest amateur event in New England.
Suzanne: This event is really the brainchild of Rick Zielfelder and David together. Rick is seeing all of these big events that Factory Connection is involved in and seeing that they are not here. We have a lot of great racing and organizations but we have to travel so far to be in the bigger events and he just feels like why not here.
David: We need to bring something great here. We have all these great organizations going, all these fast guys racing in different places, let’s put them all together and see who really is fast.
Suzanne: Plus it will groom these next generation riders you’ll get to see these little diamonds coming out and the competition is great to hone that. We can’t say right now who it is but we are planning to have a well-known national rider come for this event also.
(authors note; they are referring to a certain Factory Connection Honda pilot, #5 I believe…but you didn’t get that from me)

Who will you have riding for the Winchester Speedpark/Keene Motorsports team this year?
David: Eric Soucy will be back with us, we have Kip Komosa on the team this year. We will also have Youth rider Matt Fisk and professional snocrosser Matt Boron rounding out the team this year.

At the end of the race day when your laying your head down on the pillow, what is that one thought that will just nag at you?
Suzanne: Injury..absolutely.
David: Definitely injury or if someone is not happy, something we couldn’t fix.

At the end of the race day when your laying your head down on the pillow what is that one thought that makes you smile?
Suzanne: We did it again! Just that we had a good event and everyone was happy, good connections with people.
David: I watch all the races so seeing people have a good race day is great but we aren’t kidding; when the ambulance doesn’t leave we’re happy. We’ll go up to the ambulance company and say “glad you didn’t have to do your job today”. We take it very personally.

David and Suzanne would like to thank all of their sponsors: Keene Motorsports, Factory Connection, Tucker Rocky with Answer gear, Kendra Tires, Troy Lee Design, Spectro Oil, Tri-Star Racing, TSS Graphics and HRP Sports. We would also like to thank all of the wonderful families that have raced with us, we look forward to seeing you all for another great season.

For more information about Moto Sports magazine publisher
Paul Buckley check out his web site.
http://www.buckleyphotos.com