Mystery Creek Speedway.                              Back to NZ Speedways.

This track in the middle of the rich Waikato Dairy country, was opened on an Autumn evening in April 1972. There was a stock car track at Forest Lake near Hamilton, which was to close in March 1979, but efforts to run Midgets and TQ's along with the stockcars was not successful.
     The new track was situated 80 miles south of Auckland and built by the Hamilton Speedway Club led by the founders Pat Leggatt, Jim Simmons and Brian Prestidge. It was situated in the expo grounds of the National Field Days at Kaipaki, just south of the city of Hamilton. After a four month delay caused by local complaints, the first meeting was run before 6000 patrons at $1 per head, so the dwindling club funds were propped up again. Sixteen Auckland midget cars attended but by the start of the feature race only nine were left running. The drivers had trouble adapting to this new track. Graham Hartnell and Trevor Morris were the stars of the day in midgets along with Eddie James, Leo Vercoe and Nick Carter. In the solo bikes it was Bryce Subritsky who led the running along with Bruce Mitchell.  Other races were held for TQ's and Side Cars.
    The club ran successfully for about 6 or 7 years and here is what Peter Sharpe wrote to me recently.
" I think it  closed 1978 - 79. By then the Club was in financial poo. The Fieldays (owners of the land) kept escalating the rent, as they wanted the Speedway Club out. Speedway was also in decline as a spectator sport and crowds were thin on the ground, as were high-end competitors.
The Club was basically being run by the Quintal family - nice people, as I remember. At one stage, all 3 brothers raced TQ's and their Mum - a feisty old girl, with a heart of Gold (unless you crossed her...) was organizing things.  Ex TQ driver from the 60s -  Rod Ellis was Announcer.
All a far cry from the Club's heyday of around 1973, when Ivan Mauger, Barry Briggs, Ronnie Moore & a whole lot of top riders from Europe visited - including the current (at the time ) World Champion - Ole Olsen. "

If anyone can you help fill the gaps, please contact the webmaster.   Below are two riders on the opening day. John Roberts and Johnny Sweetman.

This photo of Solo's at Mystery Creek from Robert Andrews site.

This programme cover shows Dennis Penny driving a TQ owned by Brian Prestige and John Sharpe. The photo below shows the midgets of Trevor Morris 'T' boning Graham Hartnell.  This information sent to us by Peter Sharpe of Wellington who was a photographer at this track.

Photo at right is of the track showing its position in the Mystery Creek complex.