Creating A Racing Haven In Charlotte
Charlotte, North Carolina is a racing town. It’s home to the NASCAR Hall of Fame, nearly all of the main racing garages for NASCAR teams and Charlotte Motor Speedway, one of the most heralded tracks in the NASCAR circuit. Against this backdrop, on the very same property as the Speedway, a new, luxury “automotive country club,” called Ten Tenths Motor Club, is redefining what a car enthusiast community can look like.
The project is headed by some of the biggest power brokers in the sport: Marcus Smith, CEO of Speedway Motorsports, and Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports, and founder of the Hendrick Automotive Group. He’s the winningest team owner in NASCAR history and his team is the largest privately held dealership group in the United States. He has fielded cars for drivers like Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr. Smith, on the other hand, has been CEO of Speedway Motorsports for a decade and is a descendant of NASCAR royalty. His father, O. Bruton Smith, owned Speedway Motorsports and built Charlotte Motor Speedway in 1960. Speedway Motorsports now owns and operates 11 speedways, all of which host one, if not multiple, NASCAR races each season.
After nearly a decade in-the-making, Speedway Motorsports and Hendrick Performance built the club on the expansive Charlotte Motor Speedway property, which includes 2,000 acres of land and nearly a million square-feet of asphalt. It opened this month. Ten Tenths now sits on what used to be one of the camping lots for RVs visiting Charlotte Motor Speedway. The new club, though still in its infancy stages, features a high-end, 20,000 square-foot clubhouse and a 1.7 mile racing track that can be set to three different configurations. As you drive around the Ten Tenths race course, the massive, 95,000-capacity Speedway sits right in the background.
The private club offers access to the clubhouse and the racetrack, where they can take their prized rides out for a spin. From the clubhouse, positioned above the start line, can enjoy a luxurious space to watch as cars race by. Graham Smith, vice president at Speedway Motorsports, says the clubhouse was inspired by a similar property they built at their Sonoma track called Turn 11. While the design of the buildings appear nearly identical, with flexible indoor/outdoor concepts, Smith says Ten Tenths is “a little bigger and a little more modern” than Turn 11. Plus, the two serve differing purposes. Turn 11 is more of a general hospitality and event space open to rent, whereas Ten Tenths is a private club.
Despite its proximity to Charlotte Motor Speedway and the fierce driving that comes with it, the Ten Tenths track was built for “entertainment driving.” The average width is 42 feet with generous runoff areas. It was designed by F1 veteran and two-time 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Alexander Wurz. There are two tracks that can be combined to make a 1.7 mile course, called the Full Circuit. The Short Course is the larger of the two at 1.1 miles in length, which Smith says is more technical with elevation changes and hard breaks. The Inner Loop, a little over half a mile, has more sweeping turns that make it suitable for drifting and training.
Inside the clubhouse, special amenities await, none more appealing than the cigar and Bourbon lounge. “We have a lot of cigar lovers in the development process,” says Smith, who notes their knowledge has been helpful in building the space. The lounge has a humidor with a selection of cigars, and are free to bring their own smokes.
As for hip, leadership is focused on establishing the right community rather than exclusivity. “We want to start with people who have helped build this,” says Smith. “It’ll be invite-only to start but we want to hear from people who are interested and references they might have in this world that we live in.” There are no plans to have hip tiers; the goal is to create a welcoming, equal atmosphere centered around a love for cars. “We’re trying to avoid taking people’s money just for the sake of taking people’s money,” he says.
As of now, the track and the fully-outfitted clubhouse are the only finished portions of Ten Tenths, but a grander vision lies ahead. With the foundational pieces in place, the next pieces of this grand puzzle will roll-out in phases. Soon, they hope to install climate-controlled storage bays and a full-service garage. The latter will be facilitated by Hendrick Performance, set to launch in the summer of this year, which will offer “white-clove concierge services to all Ten Tenths Motor Club ” for the following services: vehicle inspections, testing, all maintenance work, detailing, door-to-door transportation services and much more. Given Hendrick’s deep connections in the automotive world, they’ll also be able to facilitate manufacturer-specific dealership maintenance, repairs, warranty work, performance upgrades and manufacturer recalls through virtually all of the major high-end car producers.
“Our goal is to create a motorsport village,” says Smith. Ten Tenths hip is looking for “like-minded people who enjoy cars, cigars, guns and all the things that we do.” The “guns” reference wasn’t a misstep there by Smith, the broader vision for Ten Tenths goes way beyond just cars and racing. The team has loads of space to work with on the massive acreage of the Charlotte Motor Speedway property, and with that space comes big ideas. Current plans include adding additional amenities such as client condos and custom villas, a shooting range, a golf course, performance centers and more. “The beauty of this project is that when you have people like Rick and Marcus at it, it can develop and it’s only going to get cooler,” says Smith. The end vision nearly resembles that of high-end, amenity-heavy golf resorts that seem to be growing in popularity, except this property has with a racing twist.
Ten Tenths Motor Club had its grand opening in early April, which included a weekend tailor-made for car enthusiasts. The show started on Friday with Pro-Am races featuring classic Trans Am Series cars with racing stars like Jeff Gordon and Max Papis, among others. The event raised more than $250,000 for Speedway Children’s Charities. But the festivities were anchored by the third annual Heritage Invitational, a car show with a world–class lineup of more than 70 rare and historic automobiles showcased in various classes like Porsche Racing History, Lambo Mania, Pre-War and Post-War Classics and more. Rick Hendrick also showcased his remarkable private collection, which is so impressive it got a class of its own.
You can see more of these beautiful rides below:
