Promoter & Administrator

Barry Butterworth
Promoter & Administrator

Barry had aspirations to be a Speedway Promoter for some time and in April 1984, he promoted his first event at the Kumeu Agriculture and Horticulture Society grounds. Over 10,000 patrons turned up for the Easter meeting. He was Promoter of Northline Speedway in Darwin for the 1985-86 season. He ran another meeting at Kumeu at Easter 1987. Along with Brian Tracey, Barry set up the Circle Track Racing Association (CTRA) in Aug 1987. They ran mid-week meetings at Waikaraka Park during the 1987-88 season. Barry built his own track at Meremere (the 1/3 mile highbank track) and ran his first meeting there in Feb 1988. He relinquished his promotional rights to Meremere in 1990.

Newspaper story on the new Speedway event to be run at Kumeu.

Without the considerable backing and help from Bruce Drinkrow (and his company Kaipara Excavators) neither the Kumeu nor Meremere tracks would have been completed. Drinkrow was a very successful businessman, entrepreneur and philanthropist who dabbled in both circuit racing and speedway. He sadly died prematurely in 1997.
(Colin Irwin photo sourced from http://www.sap.net.nz/)

For the CTRA Waikaraka Park meetings Brian Tracey was the Promoter. Brian was a friend of Barry's from way back in the days when Barry first started driving midgets at Western Springs. Brian was a safe and professional middle marker who retired from speedway before he planned when he sold his offenhauser-powered midget to his ambitious teenage son, Ted. Ted, of course, went on to become seven times NZ Midget Champion.

The front page of the official programme for the first Kumeu Easter meeting in 1984. A photo of Barry B racing the Gennetten Chev V4 at Western Springs is in the top left-hand corner.

At the first Kumeu meeting, over Easter 1984, Barry was star driver in the Shores sprintcar (and his midget) as well as promoter.
(Colin Irwin photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Promoter, Barry Butterworth, hands the winners CRC jacket to sprintcar driver Tony Allen while Stan Smith (fellow outlaw) looks after the PA system at Kumeu, 1984.
(Alan Clark photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ

(Newspaper clipping of the time)

After the second Kumeu meeting it was war between Barry and the NZSCB. Here is Barry's side of the story from his column in New Zealand Dirt Track Racing, July 1987.

Advertisement for the first mid-week Waikaraka Park CTRA meeting.
(From www.freewebs.com/nzctra/history.htm)

Message from Brian Tracey, Promoter of the CTRA Waikaraka Park events published in the programme of Meeting No 1.

The cover of the programmes for the first and fourth CTRA meetings held at Waikaraka Park which were promoted by Brian Tracey, a long-time friend of Barry B. The CTRA was affiliated with the Motorsport Association of New Zealand (MANZ) and ran mid-week shows at Waikaraka Park. Ted Tracey, Brett Horrobin and Steve Keene travelled to Tauranga with their midgets to compete in the NZ Midget Car Championship (under the control of The NZ Speedway Control Board) but were turned away because they raced at Waikaraka Park. As a result, at the third meeting the NZ "Open" Midget Car Championship was held (see above) and was duly won by Ted Tracey (Brian's son).

A big crowd was present at the second Kumeu meeting at Easter 1987. Here, Paul Rollinson (#47) leads Max Butterworth in the Ken Mullins VW #22.
(Dion Mayson photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Barry holds the trophy aloft after a win at Waikaraka Park during one of the mid-weak CTRA meetings in 1988. Promoter, and friend, Brian Tracey is doing the presentation and interview.
(Alan Clark photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Brendan Butterworth (in the outlaw hat) presenting a trophy to his smiling dad, Barry, at the Kumeu Easter Outlaw Nationals.
(https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150155107752461&set=t.
100002028119128&type=3&theater)

Advertisement for a Meremere Outlaw Event.
(From www.freewebs.com/nzctra/history.htm)

The front cover of the official programmes for the first ever meeting at Meremere and the third Outlaw Nationals (and the first to be held at Meremere). The cover for the first meeting fittingly shows the original Kiwi outlaw himself, Barry B hugging the pole line at Meremere at a practice day with Dave Tollemache on the outside. The "outlaw" logo, which first appeared on Barry's Mercury Motors Outlaw Sprintcar in 1980, adorns the cover of the Easter Outlaws meeting!

Barry prepared the track at Meremere high bank facility as well as being promoter and driver! He was a busy man. The first meeting was held on February 21, 1988.
(Alan Clark photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Rival promoters, and old friends, Barry Butterworth (Meremere) and Reece Facoory (Western Springs) pose for the camera at Western Springs in 1989. The fight between the Western Springs promotion and Barry Butterworth and CTRA was well and truly over by then. Barry and Reece knew each other well having raced each other in TQs back in the late 1950s.
(Alan Clark photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Barry hard at work in his grader watering the track before a 1989 Meremere meeting. (John Vines photo from https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100008394910876&fref=photo)

Promoter, Barry B, conducts the drivers briefing prior to a Meremere event.
(Ian Abrahams photo from One Tough Dude, The Barry Butterworth Story by Alan Batt, Speedway Classics, Alan Batt, Christchurch, NZ)

Barry's Ray Alach Racecars sprintcar parked at Aotea Square in the centre of Auckland City in a display promoting Outlaw racing at the Meremere track.
(From http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.120671578010445.
23574.100002028119128&type=3)

Sprintcar racing on the third-mile high bank track was fast and spectacular.
(from http://macgor.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=stockcarmia
&thread=17510&page=3)

The 1998 Easter Nationals meeting, still run under the sanctioning of the CTRA, was promoted by the Auckland Midget Drivers Club and the Meremere Trustees. The meeting featured memorial races for both Barry Butterworth and Bruce Drinkrow – the two men who most instrumental in building the Meremere high bank facility.