The 4/10-mile track opened in 1965. Bill Greco is recorded as the track's inaugural winner, on July 16, 1965. The facility was a pavement track from 1965 to 1977, hosting grassroots racing events every Friday, including the NASCAR Modified division. NASCAR's top series visited the track twice in the early 1970s, with Richard Petty winning both races — passing Bobby Allison with four laps to go to win in 1970, and backing up the victory a year later, beating Dave Marcis by two laps.
The first pavement era ended in 1977 when Vermont's C.J. Richards bought the track and laid dirt down, making the speedway part of the Champlain Valley Racing Association (CVRA). The track later returned to pavement for a second era in 2010 and 2011, before dirt was reinstated for the 2012 season.
In 1977, C.J. Richards bought the track and converted it to dirt. After the 2011 season, Richards called Howard Commander, the promoter at Lebanon Valley Speedway, about taking over the track, which Commander did. Commander put Lyle DeVore in charge as promoter; DeVore's first job at the speedway had been picking up trash at the track at seven years old. DeVore's 2012 takeover also marked the return of a dirt surface, and he was named Racing Promotion Monthly's 47th annual Promoter of the Year in 2022. The speedway is owned and operated by LVAR (Lebanon Valley Auto Racing), with Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, NY, as its sister track.
The speedway holds dirt racing events weekly on Friday nights from April to September. It features several weekly racing divisions, including DIRTcar Modifieds, DIRTcar Sportsman, Pro Stocks and Street Stocks, with four-cylinder racers also making regular appearances. Each season brings numerous special events, with traveling racing series such as sprint cars, vintage modifieds and classic car shows filling out the schedule. Racing starts at 7:00 PM.
Introduced in 2019, the inaugural Malta Massive Weekend became a signature event showcasing all of the track's weekly divisions, capped off by a Super DIRTcar Series finale. The event has grown most years since.
Track promoter Lyle DeVore has described Albany-Saratoga's storied history as having produced local champions such as Kenny Tremont, Brett Hearn, CD Coville, and Jack Johnson, and as having been the birthplace of NASCAR greats including Richie Evans, Jerry Cook, Bugs Stevens, and Pete Hamilton.
Kenny Tremont, nicknamed the "Sand Lake Slingshot," won six straight track championships from 1994 to 1999 and earned his 12th championship in 2010 — his only title on the pavement — before taking his 13th and final title in 2015. Jack Johnson won 90 races at the track. Brett Hearn, the "Jersey Jet," won his first of 136 features on May 27, 1994, and accumulated eight track titles. Tremont, Johnson and Hearn currently sit in the top three on the track's all-time wins list.
In the dirt era, four-time Super DIRTcar Series champion Will Cagle was one of the first to win in 1977, and the first appearance of the Super DIRTcar Series came that same year when Win Slavin, who lived in nearby Troy, NY, earned his lone series win that August. C.J. Richards also put together the "Super Star Shootout," in which NASCAR Cup Series stars including Michael Waltrip, Sterling Marlin, Jimmy Spencer and Ernie Irvan battled in dirt Modifieds.
More recent Big Block Modified champions include Marc Johnson, whose first championship came in 2016, and Peter Britten, whose first title came in 2017 and who earned a second championship in 2024.
The 2025 season marked the track's 60th year. The Super DIRTcar Series kicked off the season with a 60th Anniversary Celebration on Friday, April 18, 2025 — the first time the series had opened the track's season — joined by the track's DIRTcar Sportsman and Pro Stock divisions.
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