Las Vegas Park

Established as a horse track for the Las Vegas Jockey Club, this one-mile oval only ever held three motor races which included a round of the AAA National Championship and NASCAR Grand National. Only 4,422 spectators watched new champion Jimmy Bryan score his fourth straight win in 1954 in the final round of what is now the IndyCar Series. The Indycar race had a six-car shunt after two laps and the following year’s NASCAR event was stopped when the track was blocked by a 12-car pile-up. It had to be abandoned after 111 of the 200 scheduled laps due to darkness. Unfortunately, the climate was not conducive to livestock and visitors preferred to gamble in Sin City’s casinos rather than at the racetrack. Las Vegas Park Speedway closed in 1959 and is now the site of the Las Vegas Hilton.