Glen Helen Raceway

Glen Helen Raceway is the crown jewel of West Coast motocross, a 256-acre canyon facility against the mountainside in Devore on the north edge of San Bernardino, on county land shared with Glen Helen Regional Park. Bud Feldkamp raced the ground as Arroyo Cycle Park in 1971, established Glen Helen Raceway in 1985 for sand drags and off-road racing, and ran the first motocross events here in 1988. The USGP came in 1989, the World Vet MX Championships have run here every year since 1992, and the AMA Pro Motocross National called Glen Helen home from 1996 through 2009 and again from 2014 to 2018, when the track and MX Sports could not agree on a new contract. Mt. St. Helens, built in 1999, is still the most filmed hill in the sport.

Six tracks run on the property. The 1.5-mile National Track is the pro layout with its steep climbs and descents and a mix of natural and man-made obstacles on hardpack and decomposed granite that grooms well and holds up through SoCal summers when the water trucks keep up. The Arroyo Vet Track on the west side is the tighter expert and intermediate loop, the Stadiumcross track hosts AME Minicross on Thursday nights, and there are PeeWee/E-Bike and Stacyc loops for the smallest riders plus a Short Course Truck Track for UTVs, quads and buggies. Fifty-cc bikes stay off the National and Arroyo Vet tracks on regular practice days.

Practice runs Tuesday 9 to 5 and Thursday 8 AM to dusk, plus some Saturdays and Sundays 8 to 2 when the calendar is clear, at $35 per bike, $20 per 50cc, $10 per Stacyc and $35 per truck-track vehicle, with spectators $10 and gate entry sold in advance at mx-tickets.com. The Cash App loyalty program makes every sixth practice free. There are no flaggers or ambulances on practice days, no early entry, no pit riding of any kind including e-bikes, no riding outside the track boundaries, and a 10 mph speed limit in the park. Permanent restrooms with hot showers, the HYR General Store for parts, snacks and tire changes (Tuesday and Thursday 9 to 2, weekends 9 to 3), food vendors at most events, a dog park, the Glen Helen Museum and the Walk of Fame round out the grounds. Camping is dry only, $20 per night, allowed on the nights before race events, with quiet time at 10 PM, fires in contained pits and no outside alcohol.

The race calendar is as deep as any in the country: Saturday MX at the Glen most weekends, the Wiseco 2-Stroke MX World Championship each spring, MotoFest with a $100,000 purse the week before the pro season opens, the 3Bros 6, 10 and 24-hour endurance races, the Giant RV Short Course Series, Dubya World Vet, the Yamaha bLU cRU Invitational, Red Bull Day in the Dirt, SRA Grand Prix, Swap Moto and SoCal Vet MX. From the Inland Empire it is 30 minutes, from Los Angeles about 75 and from San Diego two hours up the 15.