Located in the southern reaches of the Valley, Radford Racing School has been offering high-octane thrills since 1968. More than 5,000 people each year come to the track to test their skills in performance driving and road racing classes. Participants learn from professional coaches with impressive racing pedigrees, such as Danny Bullock, chief instructor at the school.  

“Everybody sees our sign and thinks that all we do is racing, which is one portion of it, but we run the gamut,” Bullock explains. “We teach teenagers how to be better drivers on the street, we teach enthusiasts who are looking to develop more skills to enjoy their cars more, and we also have aspiring and established racecar drivers who come here to get better.” 

The 8-acre campus features a 1.6 mile, 15-turn track along with three other courses and a NHRA drag strip. Most experiences feature the Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat, but the school also offers go-karting and a Formula 4 training course that puts drivers in the cockpit of a Ligier JS F4. Thanks to a partnership with Dodge, any purchases of a new Dodge SRT comes with a free class focused on controlling a performance vehicle.

“That’s important,” says Chris Jacobs, host of Overhaulin’ and part of the Mecum Auctions broadcast team. “I have a [Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat] Redeye as my daily driver, and if you ever driven one you know they can get a little squirrely, so having some high-performance driving experience is a good thing.” 

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Radford Racing School also has a relationship with Mecum Auctions, which will be bringing collector, vintage and antique cars and motorcycles to the State Farm Stadium March 23 through April 1. John Kraman, director of company relations and Mecum Auctions spokesperson, says that whether folks have a $10,000 or $10 million collector car, the auction has an affordable position for that entry.  

“We’ll do more business in one big five-day auction in Glendale than the average midsize car dealership will do in an entire year,” he concludes. “And we’re doing it with other people’s cars in a venue that we rent while bringing in people — and [beating dealership sales] over the course of a few days.”