As restrictions around regional NSW slowly begin to ease, Wakefield Park has already begun planning its return to action with a blockbuster event scheduled for the weekend of October 23 and 24.
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Operations manager, Dean Chapman, hopes to end Wakefield's hiatus with a Motorsport Australia State Championship.
"We're planning on holding a big race meeting to get us back underway," Chapman said.
"It should draw a large amount of people to town. There should be a bit of activity around the local cafes, pubs, accommodation on that first weekend that we re-open.
With the event all but confirmed, Chapman is waiting for the current lockdown in the Goulburn Mulwaree LGA to be lifted, and then the final hurdle will be whether or not Sydney and Canberra residents can travel to Goulburn and vice versa.
"If Sydney and Canberra residents are able to travel, which we believe will be the case by the 23rd and 24th from listening to the chief minister from Canberra and the NSW premier, we should be well underway," Chapman said.
"We require that movement throughout the state, for people to move without exemption.
"We've got a lot of people who are keen and interested in coming to the event, I think it'll be a huge weekend for not only Wakefield Park but Goulburn as a community."
The event itself will see the return of a number of fan favourites including sports sedans and formula cars, the highlight of which, Chapman said, would likely be the Formula Fords.
"They're your next household names, the people driving in that series," he said.
"They haven't been able to race at all for six months now, so there's a lot of kids who are making motorsport their lifelong career that will be coming to Wakefield Park on that weekend."
The return of racing to Wakefield Park will be a relief for Chapman for multiple reasons. First and foremost, he said, it will help to assure the staff who work to keep the track running year-round that their jobs are safe.
"Our staff have been concerned about their jobs for the past 24 months," Chapman said.
"When COVID hit, the question mark got even larger. The fact that things might start to return to normal in October eases a bit of pressure on my staff.
"They've dealt with it really well, and I commend them on how focused they've been on getting the job done and delivering high-quality events while all this is happening in the background.
"The biggest thing that this revenue injection will do is see my staff become a little less stressed."
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