Vancouver Island’s last speedway keeps a new generation of drivers at the wheel

Unassuming in size, with modest grandstands and a simple pit lane, the Saratoga Speedway transforms over the course of a few short laps into a place filled with thunderous noise, clouds of tire smoke and a few thousand racing fans enjoying the spectacle of the last motorsport track on Vancouver Island.

As developers buy up land, neighbourhoods encroach on old tracks, and noise complaints rise, old tracks around the West Coast have been shut down and converted to cul-de-sacs and residential homes. The oldest track in Western Canada, Westshore Motorsports Park in Langford, B.C., closed down in 2022, after 68 years, leaving Saratoga as the last dedicated track on the island and one of the oldest in the country.