GRAND FORKS, N.D. — Wayne Anderson was one of the biggest supporters of dirt track racing in the upper Midwest. He owned race teams, supported other competing race teams, sponsored events, drivers and race tracks, founded the Northern Outlaw Sprint Ass’n.
Anderson was also a partner in River Cities Speedway and the track will honor Anderson with a four-race series known as the Wayne Anderson Cup.
Those four races — July 8, July 9, Aug. 6 and Sept. 10 — will boast an increased payout for the Buffalo Wild Wings NOSA Sprints and drivers will be accumulating points for the overall Wayne Anderson Cup championship.
“Honestly, without Wayne Anderson, I wouldn’t be racing and I would think there wouldn’t be a NOSA series either,” said 10-time NOSA champion, Wade Nygaard. “The Wayne Anderson Cup means a lot to all of us involved with NOSA. It means a lot to me to do the best I can at those races and I would sure like to come home the winner of that deal.”
River Cities Speedway partner and four-time NLRA Late Model series champion, Brad Seng echoed Nygaard’s statements.
“Let’s face it, there wouldn’t be sprint car racing around here let alone NOSA without Wayne’s vision. He wanted to get guys building 410 motors that were basically laying around in garages… something the average person could put together and go sprint car racing,” said Seng, who was a nephew to Anderson. “It’s evolved to another level now, but Wayne was the pioneer.”
Nygaard drove for Anderson for eight seasons from the mid-1990s through the early-2000s. Nygaard started his racing career driving his family-owned car with the No. 6N, but has donned the No. 9 on the sideboards of his NOSA Sprint Car since teaming with Anderson.
“It was a lot of fun driving for Wayne. We had such a great team back then and a lot of fun,” Nygaard added. “So many people are still involved in racing because of Wayne. He touched a lot of people. It really does mean a lot to me that we do well at these events this year.”
If you can’t make it to River Cities Speedway for the Wayne Anderson Cup events, you can watch live on SPEED SPORT Network affiliate RiverCitiesSpeedway.TV.