|| *Comments on Lakeview Speedway:* View the most recent comment <#11> | Post a comment <#post> 1. Cooper posted: 03.28.2010 - 1:15 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) One of the early NASCAR tracks. Only races were in 1951. Lakeview Speedway was located in Mobile, Alabama. The 3/4 Dirt oval, was closed in 1953 2. Buddy Bielarski Mobile Ala, posted: 06.15.2010 - 1:45 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) These Races was at New Mobile Speedway in mobile ala, not at Lakeview Speedway The one Nascar race at Lakeview Fred Moore drove my 1951 Hudson Hornet Number 91, 3. Aldo posted: 08.13.2015 - 11:28 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Does someone know the exact place of this racetrack? 4. Aldo posted: 08.13.2015 - 11:41 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) From satellite view, it seems to be round a little lake just the cross between Lott Road and James Evans Drive, in Eight Mile neighborhood. 5. John ward posted: 04.06.2016 - 3:36 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) I grew up there it's a 5\8 mile oval with a lake in the middle just off Lott and Myers Rd. Behind a church 6. Andy U posted: 12.11.2018 - 7:43 am Rate this comment: (1) (0) Oh my god. Never give up, never give in. Found a historical aeerial view site and it has this track I was talking about in South Mobile. The photo sure looks like there is a wall around the SW end of the track. Pic is cut off half the track. zoom in and looksee http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Tillmans_Corner_1952.html This is a 1960 pic that shows the whole track. With stands. http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Tillmans_Corner_1960.html Mostly gone by 74. Trees in the track. http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Tillman_s_Corner_1974.html 7. Andy U posted: 12.11.2018 - 7:43 am Rate this comment: (1) (0) well the 1953 Kushla AL map from USGS shows a paved road around the lake mentioned above. No note of a racetrack, no buildings at the track that would appear to be stands. You can actually "drive" with Google Maps street view up this James Evans Drive. At the end you can see the lake and it sure looks like a banked turn going into a straight. The track is not on the 1942 map and neither is the lake. I guess this is gonna take a first hand account. For #2 above....WHAT? Flock and his monkey drove the 91 Hornet. #5....are you saying this is the track from the 2 NASCAR races or just making a comment about a random track? Definitely not Mobile International Speedway, it is not on a 53 map. I found another track on the 1953 map. The Theodore AL map. Looks like a paperclip and is slightly visible now. On the map the track is oriented roughly from 8 to 2 o'clock. Just thinking the north was the front, then Cypress Business Park Dr would cut across from the finish line to the 3rd turn. There is a row of trees that looks like it traces the turns 1 and 2 and part of the backstretch. Turns 3 and 4 would go around the traffic circle. Maybe it was a dog or horse track...who knows. But in 1953 it was DIRT like the race. Unlike the track around the lake. In 67 it was still there and with improved access. There still in 82 with no changes. Gone in 85. Was not there in 44. I am scouring every 1953 series map in the whole Mobile area adn this track has to be it. I noticed by the elevation lines that it is a banked track. Not for dogs or horses.... I think this is gonna take some little old lady at the mobile Historical Society to solve, 8. jmlewis9689 posted: 09.01.2019 - 5:29 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Andy U, thank you for posting those images. That's got to be the 3/4 mile dirt oval that hosted the pair of cup races back in 1951. According to the Wikipedia and Third Turn, "Lakeview Speedway" was also called "Mobile Speedway" and "New Mobile Speedway." "Mobile International Speedway" is a 1/2 mile paved oval (I'm not sure if it was dirt at one point) that opened in 1965 ("Lakeview Speedway" closed in 1953) and is a completely different track. "Mobile International Speedway" is not very far from the track shown in the images posted by Andy U, but it is unfortunately not visible in those images. If whatever is surrounding Cochran Lake is a race track for motorsports, it seems like there would have been much more information on it. How many stock car race tracks are right on the shore of a lake like that? I could be wrong, but that just screams "legendary" to me. If Tom Pistone drove in (or with) scuba gear at Daytona over fears of Lake Lloyd, similar stories would have emerged about this particular track. I can definitely see why people would think the Cochran Lake track is Lakeview Speedway since it's right on the shore of a lake. I did a little research on this too and posted my findings at the following Imgur link: https://imgur.com/gallery/FZIeZNX The oldest image available from Google Earth Pro goes back to 02/10/1997. Despite the vegetation, there appears to be a race track shape still visible, along with trails outside of it. The second-oldest image available via Google Earth Pro was from 2002, and the race track shape is essentially gone. In 2019, some of the trails are still visible, but Cypress Business Park Drive appears to have wiped out the last traces of the race track. Even if someone were to visit the site, I doubt the remnants of the track would have survived that much heavy construction equipment running through them. Here is a link to some interesting comments about Lakeview Speedway. They state that a woman died at the track from being hit by a tire that flew off of one of the race cars: https://stockcarracing.fandom.com/wiki/Lakeview_Speedway Andy U is right. This will take a firsthand eyewitness account or some trips to the Historic Mobile Preservation Society to find out what's really going on with this. They appear to have an online contact page that may be worth pursuing: https://www.historicmobile.org/contact I am originally from the Mobile, AL area and never remember hearing any stories about Lakeview Speedway, either of its aliases, or whatever road or track is surrounding Cochran Lake. Most of the local racing stories I heard were based around Mobile International Speedway, some friends who raced go-karts (I can't remember where they raced), and some friends/church members who were mechanics that worked on some cars that raced at Mobile International Speedway. There really weren't many fellow NASCAR fans in Mobile, but college football is basically a religion in that area. On a side note, I was in my late teens when "Alabama Motorsports Park" was announced (as well as the Earnhardt affiliation). That never came to fruition, and I drove right by the sign for it that stood for several years. It was sad to see it fade over time. Looks like they finally took it down in 2018 or 2019. 9. jmlewis9689 posted: 09.01.2019 - 9:16 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) I did some more research on Cochran Lake and came to similar conclusions as Andy U's in post #7. Cochran Lake and the surrounding track/road do not appear on the available 1941 topo maps, but they do appear in the Eight Mile aerial imagery starting in 1952. There is some imagery from 1938 available, but I could not find this exact area in it. Below is a list of the sources I used. Aerial imagery of the Eight Mile area which shows Cochran Lake and the surrounding track: 1952: http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Eightmile_1952.html 1960: http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Eight_Mile_1960.html 1966: http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Eight_Mile_1966.html 1974: http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/aerials/Counties/Mobile/Mobile_Eight_Mile_1974.html 1941 topo map of Creola without Cochran Lake: http://cartweb.geography.ua.edu/lizardtech/iserv/calcrgn?cat=North%20America%20and%20United%20States&item=States/Alabama/Topos/altopos/15_creola.sid&wid=500&hei=400&props=item(Name,Description),cat(Name,Description)&style=default/view.xsl&plugin=true Another 1941 topo map of Creola without Cochran Lake: http://legacy.lib.utexas.edu/maps/topo/alabama/txu-pclmaps-topo-al-creola-1941.jpg More recent topo map with Cochran Lake and the surrounding track: https://www.topozone.com/alabama/mobile-al/reservoir/cochran-lake/ Fishbrain page that shows fish do indeed live in Cochran Lake: https://fishbrain.com/fishing-waters/lmOSQans/cochran-lake After all that, I'm almost 100% positive that the track that Andy U mentions in post #6 hosted the two NASCAR cup races in 1951. That track has a dirt surface, an exterior wall, possibly grandstands, etc. I'm not seeing much, if any evidence of these around the Cochran Lake track. If the Cochran Lake track had guardrails or walls, they have been long gone at this point (I could definitely see people stealing guardrails from this area and scrapping them). If the Cochran Lake track did indeed host the two NASCAR cup races in 1951, it would have been paved between November 1951 and February of 1952 (assuming the dirt surface info is correct). Although this could be possible, I don't think it's very likely. With its longer straightaways, the Tillmans Corner track looks more like 3/4 mile and the Cochran Lake track looks to be more like 5/8 mile as Jeff Ward mentioned in post #5. After typing all this out, I just realized the buildings right next to the site of the old Tillmans Corner track do indeed have Mobile addresses and zip codes. This could be even more evidence that the Tillmans Corner track is indeed the true Lakeview Speedway. Also, this picture is supposedly from one of the 1951 Lakeview Speedway races. Looks much more like the paperclip track near Tillmans Corner and definitely no sign of a lake in the infield: https://fantasynascarracin.yolasite.com/resources/Lakeview%20NC.jpg An AL.com article with another picture from the track: https://www.al.com/sports/2013/05/four_hall_of_famers_in_one_nas.html This now begs some questions: When exactly were the track and the lake built? Most likely between 1941 and February 21st, 1952. The asphalt in the 1952 imagery is very dark and looks much lighter in the 1960 imagery. This has me thinking late 1940's-1951. After 2-3 summers, asphalt in this area goes from jet black to its usual light black/dark gray color. Who built this track and/or Lake Cochran? I haven't been able to find any information on this and don't remember hearing anything about it when I lived near Mobile. There's a Cochran Rd very close to Cochran Lake, so that might be a clue. What was this track used for and who/what raced there? It looks big enough to be usable for stock cars, but it doesn't appear to have been set up for spectators. The April 1951 race for Lakeview Speedway shows 9,500 in attendance, and I think that would have been a bit much for the Cochran Lake track. Even in the 1960 aerial imagery, this track looks like it hasn't been maintained very well. Maybe there were bigger plans that never panned out and it was cheaper to let it be? Assuming my assumptions are correct, why was the Tillmans Corner track called "Lakeview Speedway" if it wasn't near a lake? That could explain the "Mobile Speedway" and "New Mobile Speedway" monikers. Maybe they didn't want to call it "Creekview Speedway"? If any NASCAR division actually raced at the Cochran Lake track, then how come we haven't heard any stories about "Remember the time in 1951 when there was a cup race with a lake instead of infield grass?" Lee Petty was in both races and Richard would have been 13-14 at the time. If Richard wasn't there in person, I'm sure he would have heard a secondhand story about this over the years. Someone like Mike Joy or Bob Jenkins probably would have mentioned it during a broadcast at some point. That, and EA probably would have made a fantasy track about it in one of their NASCAR games. If I lived in the Mobile area for almost all of my life and I drove within 1/4 of a mile of Cochran Lake hundreds of times, how come I didn't realize any of this existed until I moved across the country? Sometimes I'm just dumb like that. 10. ttcm51 posted: 06.15.2020 - 8:43 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) We moved to wayfarer drive in 1960 which was right down from that race track in 8 mile. I used to go fishing in that lake all the time.There was a lot of pavement on that track in 1960.If I remember right,it seems like that track was shaped like a D.Anyway on bright sunny days in the summer you could see the tops of a couple of cars in there.Dont know if they were race cars but they were definately cars.Anyway the fishing was good.Used to tear the big bream up in there.Read a story one time in the mobile press that talked about some of the racing they had there,Talked about some driver having a wreak and his eyeball had popped out and they popped it back in and he was all right,and they had fights among drivers there all the time. 11. A posted: 07.17.2020 - 6:15 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) The track at the end of James Evans Drive around Lake Cochran is very, very visible on the 1952 and 1955 satellite views on historic aerials. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Post a comment:* Your comment may not appear immediately - all comments must be approved by the moderator. Name: Comment: