The amphitheater at the Napavine Community Park has now been repurposed into a dirt track for remote control (RC) car enthusiasts, thanks to the efforts of Sherri and Brandon Gallagher, owners of RC 360 Hobbies in Centralia.
Having opened their business in 2020 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Gallaghers have seen it continue to grow. The idea to open up a RC hobby store was their way to get families interacting with each other and giving them something to do together while stay-at-home orders were in place during the pandemic.
Even with those isolation orders long gone, many Lewis County residents who picked up the RC car hobby during the pandemic are still into it today. However, with the nearest free-to-use and open-to-the-public RC tracks being in either Tacoma or Portland, places to race their RC cars were limited — until now.
The Chronicle visited RC 360 on Saturday, Sept. 7, to talk with Sherri about how their business continues to grow and about the creation of Napavine’s new dirt RC track.
That track features a dirt oval for racing and a rock crawling area. It is now open to the public and free to use during normal park hours — dawn to dusk seven days a week — at Napavine Community Park, located at 207 W. Washington St. Due to Napavine noise ordinances, only battery-powered RC cars are allowed at the new track.
According to Sherri, they’ve found out the hobby does a lot more than just help bring people together.
“All of our ideas are always trying to bring people, families and friends together,” Sherri said. “And there’s a ton of people that come in here who have said they’ve overcome drugs and alcohol because this hobby has kept them occupied.”
Originally, Brandon got his kids RC cars during the pandemic as a way to help them not only pass the time while isolated, but have fun together.
While retail stores such as Walmart do sell RC cars, they are considered toy-grade and are often governed to slower speeds. Additionally, parts are not easily replaceable or customizable.
The Gallaghers specialize in selling hobby-grade RC cars, which are almost as customizable as actual cars these days with owners being able to select from a wide variety of custom parts from different RC car manufacturers. From tires and shocks to power units and steering servos, if something breaks on one of these cars, it is easily replaceable.
“There’s so many different things you can do to these and completely modify them,” Sherri said.
From there, the business was born and grew, and now with countless Lewis County families frequenting RC 360 for new parts and upgrades to their RC cars, the couple realized there was a new need — a local track for families to race their cars at, especially since these RC cars go much faster, with some hitting 50 mph or more.
Many hobbyists in the area have to travel far distances for a track where they can race their custom creations safely without having to worry about it getting run over by a real car, or possibly injuring someone or damaging someone’s property.
“We live up in Napavine, and we were walking on the dirt trails around the park on the backside where the old amphitheater is,” Sherri said. “We were walking back there, and I was like, ‘Man, this would be the perfect set up because of how it’s laid out.’ It’s all fenced in. There’s platforms where you can stand for it to be safe.”
The City of Napavine owns the park and amphitheater, so Sherri approached the city council pitching the idea of repurposing it into an RC track.
“I said, ‘Hey, let’s utilize this. It’s just been sitting here being overgrown and not used. Concerts don’t come up here,’” she said.
At first the council was hesitant to go through with it, wanting to retain the space for rentals and possible concerts but allowed the Gallaghers to do a test run with a temporary RC park for 1/24 scale cars during the Napavine Funtime Festival earlier this year to gauge interest.
Since the turnout during the Funtime Festival was so great, they got the Napavine City Council’s OK to open their RC Park on a trial run basis over the next year.
Now, Napavine has a safe place for families and hobbyists to go race their cars, which Sherri believes will also benefit the Napavine community as a whole.
As far as she knows, this is the only free-to-use and open-to-the-public RC track between Tacoma and Portland, meaning residents from throughout Southwest Washington now have a new track to use.
The only other tracks available are either pay-to-use or on private property.
“Now, kids can come and have a safe place to play, families to have a fun place to go, people to come into our town from all over because there is nothing,” Sherri said. “Spending money at the mom-and-pop restaurants like Frosty’s, going to get lunch and bring it back or going to have a beer at Tumac Taproom, stuff like that. All of that is going to create revenue and benefit the community.”
Other local businesses in the area she hopes will benefit include Napavine Grill, Sahara’s Pizza, Plaza Jalisco, Mountain View Wood Fired Pizza and the Super Mini Mart.
She added it was another unique addition to Napavine Community Park, which also features a skate park. As for the RC park’s actual construction, it was done entirely by volunteer work and with donated materials from local businesses and the local Lions Club.
“The park was built by me and a buddy, one of our sponsors, Schroeder Construction. He brought up his heavy equipment and did the rock crawling area … We had Sweeny’s Ace donate some material, the PVC pipes for the outline, Alderbrook Quarry donated some rock. Uriah Kennedy donated rebar stakes, and there was stuff we did out of pocket, too,” Sherri said.
With the track now completed, she said the Napavine City Council is considering adding picnic tables and other improvements to the area depending on how much it gets used.
As for the continued success of RC 360, Sherri contributed it to families, like her own, getting into the hobby and realizing it's a great way for parents and their children to connect and have fun together.
The Gallaghers host monthly RC car competition events — held on the last Saturday of each month — at RC 360’s location in Centralia.
These events also serve as swap meets for hobbyists to trade and purchase new parts to customize their RC cars. As for the competitions, the Ghallaghers have special rock crawling courses made especially for 1/24 scale cars to compete on.
This month’s 1/24 scale competition and swap meet is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 28. Entry is $5 per vehicle with registration beginning at 9:30 a.m. and competitions at 10 a.m.
“There’s cash prizes and stuff, too,” Sherri added.
RC 360 Hobbies has also expanded its inventory from RC cars and parts into other hobbies including model rocketry, plastic scale model kits with hobby paints, drones, RC planes boats, electric scooters and, coming soon, electric bikes.
The brands they specialize in include Arrma RC, Axial RC, E-Flite RC, Rage RC, Redcat Racing, Team Corally, Traxxas RC, Team Associated and more in a variety of scale sizes.
Located at 1649 Kresky Ave. at the southeast corner of the Fairway Center’s middle building, RC 360 Hobbies is open from Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
For more information, visit RC 360’s website at https://www.rc360hobbies.com/ or follow the business on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rc360hobbies.
